I'm out of town the next few weeks and taking a break from the MIBE Message.  While I'm out, enjoy the guest posts from a few of our awesome Footers' team members.  This weeks' message is courtesy of Emily Sharp, who is our Hospitality Manager and shares some perspective on “Average.”

Recently I had the opportunity to attend the Human Potential Summit, which billed itself as a collaborative opportunity to “help build the future of work and learning.” In practice, this meant a bunch of professionals talking about what makes and how to create a good job…sounds familiar for MIBE, right?

The key difference was that this group wasn’t aimed at hospitality professionals, or truly at any specific demographic like that. In order to reach a broader target audience, they had to paint in broad strokes. One topic that came up repeatedly, no matter the industry, was the concept of average.

What is average? For the American Dream, we say it’s 2.5 children, a dog, and a house with a white picket fence. But we also quickly ridicule that “2.5” children part—it may be mathematically correct, but clearly half a child is not the dream.

The thing underlying this joke, what makes it funny, is the assumption that averages are accurate representations of individuals.

Why? Because average is not in fact representational. Let’s take, for example, a Footers team member who is incredible behind the bar, but who has a spotty attendance record, tends to lose focus when assigned to basic server tasks like bussing, and can only work a few times a week. If I weight each of those categories (bar skills, server skills, availability, and attendance) equally, she’s only a 3/10. Take a bunch of other employees who are more available with better attendance and suddenly she’s way below “average.” But my bar suffers if I decide to let this team member go—I’m making a bad assumption about average.

For a different example, let’s say I’m building a training program for our chefs and have them self-report on their skills to see what we need to work on. The average results of all their responses will probably create a chef that no one exact person in the company actually aligns with. The training program I build, if it isn’t tailored to individuals, will ultimately lead to boredom and disconnect as they listen to things they already know while missing the things they don’t.

Don’t get me wrong, averages have their place. We have to be able to build our business on something and looking at the dizzying myriad of human foibles can get you too bogged down in the details. But the ultimate point of all of this is that seeing people as individuals and investing in the talents they have will build your company.

Back to that amazing but tardy bartender from earlier. I communicated with her about where she excels, and we worked out how to get her to shift on time (she has afterschool pickup, it turns out, so we were scheduling her when she couldn’t work). Now, she’s my leading bar pilot.

MIBE Awards Close November 1st!  In addition to Heart Leaders of the Year, Best Employee Recognition Program, and Best Activation of Mission or Core Values - we also have Best Internal Company Event.  We want to hear about the awesome events you are putting on for your team, so make sure to gather those photos and submit, you might just be up on stage receiving an award at our annual MIBE Summit in January!