VANNOY:

Welcome everyone. Mike Vannoy from Asure Software. Really excited about today’s guest. We’re, we’re gonna unpack I think a legendary story. Steve Robinson, former Chief Marketing Officer kind of there from the beginning, if you will with, with Chick Chick-fil-A talking about how to, how to build a brand. And I know normally we talk in our weekly show about compliance and tax and team building. I, I really wanna kind of lean in on Steve’s experience here about how, how to build a brand, how do we think about growing our companies but really primarily, how do we grow our companies through an employment brand? How do we, how do we attract the right kind of people that are, that are behind our mission, our vision, our values and how do we think about retaining and developing that talent to, to, to really be in it for the long haul? So Steve is 34 years. I, I, I guess with

ROBINSON:

Yeah, 35,

VANNOY:

Yep. 30 years with Chick-fil-A. Took it from a hundred million in, in, in sales up to nearly 6 billion. Welcome. Really looking forward to today’s conversation. Thank

ROBINSON:

You very much. Pleasure to be here. Thank you. Thank you.

VANNOY:

Yeah. All right. So let’s go ahead and jump in. May maybe, maybe for the average entrepreneur, maybe it’s the home builder who remodels kitchens and bathrooms, maybe it’s the salon owner. They think about their craft and they think about serving customers in attracting and, and doing the best work for those customers they might not think of, of a brand. Can, can we just start there? Can you kind of share what your definition of, of brand is? Maybe it’s not.

ROBINSON:

Yeah. Well I’ll give you two simple themes. One is, I operated on the premise that a brand is a promise. Which means anything and everything associated with the brand the product, the experience, relationships, anything that touches the customer is either gonna deliver on that promise, build on that promise or not. I think most people, most business people think about their business transactionally. How can I get more customers? How can I get more cash register rings? I think when you, when you look at trying to deliver on a promise, think about it now, promise is very relational. It, it’s, it’s something you have between someone you care about or love. And so, building great brands ultimately build on a relational and very often are emotional foundation.

That’s the first thought. The second thought, which builds on that, is to think of your business, every aspect of your business. I use the flywheel in my book to explain it. Every interaction point with customers. How do you design that interaction, the product, the service, the, the, the process of paying communications recruiting and developing talent. Being very conscious, very intentional about every touchpoint being designed to deliver the promise. So it, that’s part A, is a promise. Part B is in designing the, the, the strategic plans and the systems to deliver every experience that delivers on the promise. Now that said, you can’t do any of this if you have a culture that does not give you a foundation for a relationship oriented attitude. And when I walked into Chick-fil-A, I, I didn’t really understand it until I got into the interview process which went on for over five months.

 But as I spent time with Truet, Kathy, the founder of Chick-fil-A, Jimmy Collins, his, his c o o and others on the staff, I soon learned, and Truett verbalized it for me, that he was more concerned about who I was and what I was gonna do. He was trusting Jimmy and others to figure out if I could do the job, he was more interested in my character, whether we got fun together, could he trust me? And what I learned over 35 years, Mike, is that if all that was there, he will empower you. And he did empower me. And through, through his behavior with me, I empowered the talent that I attracted and the, and the team that I built. And when you have people you can trust, you have fun with, you trust their character, not just their skill.

It allows you to release creativity and innovation. Innovation doesn’t have to go vertical. It can go, it can go to the lowest levels in the organization that ultimately touch the customer. Right? Right. I, I have, I have a slide, an opening slide on my, my speech that I often give. Cause the, the, the, the culture is the soil of great brands, but only if leaders cultivate the soil. And that was, that was who true. Kathy was he called, cultivated a cultural soil that as a result, as I learned more about him and the culture allowed us to really go hard on building a relationship brand, not a transactional brand.

VANNOY:

Steve, if you could comment on, on maybe some things that a brand isn’t. So, like, when I talk to people about brand I, I, I, I, I think about experience, right? It’s, it’s, it’s what you, what we experience. It’s what we do, not what we say, right? When we walk into that storefront and we see the old I’m sure you remember you did a lot of business malls the old successories store, right? And there’s the two shaking hands in the lobby that says, our, the customer is our, is our number one, right? But yet, the the clerk doesn’t make eye contact with you, and they’re on no phone. And they’re, and, and actions don’t speak into that, if you could, about what a brand isn’t.

ROBINSON:

Well, many people think, and I, and I dealt with this for probably 10 to 15 years, the o the early part of my career at Chick-fil-A people thought brand was marketing,

VANNOY:

Right?

ROBINSON:

Oh, well, that’s just marketing. Well no marketing is, should be subject to the brand. The brand, as I’ve already said, the brand is every, every touchpoint, every experience people have with a company, that’s what the brand is. Now, most people think, okay, I gotta develop a brand for my widget, right? Well, the widget is just part of the brand. I mean, chick-fil-A was a, think about this. Chick-Fil-A was a piece of chicken on two pieces of white bread and two pickles.

VANNOY:

Two pickles, yes.

ROBINSON:

And crucial pickles. And for years, even while I was there, all they cared about was selling more of those chicken sandwiches. And yet they had a founder who was very relational. And so with time, we were able to, to step back and apply not only vigorous processed improvements to the operational experience, the food, and the the, the point of contact experience. But over time, we were able to add relational communications, fund communications using the cows we were at able to add hospitality beyond just getting the order right? We were able to, to develop systems of recruiting, development, and training where it was, it, it started with the culture. It started with truitt. It started with this whole idea of delivering the ultimate brand promise, which is, we actually care about you. You’re gonna get a great fast food experience, but you’re gonna get it from people who care about you.

That was the brain promise, which meant, you know, as, as early as as 2001, when we started thinking about ramping it up on hospitality, that meant we had 50,000 employees. We had to teach how to deliver not just the product, but to deliver hospitality, make, to your point, make eye contact, contact, smile, say, my pleasure, when somebody said, thank you. So I’m, I’m giving you a long answer, but it’s, it really goes back to my earlier point. And brand is not just the product. It’s not just advertising. A brand is everything associated with what that business does and what they stand for. And great leaders are intentional about shaping the brand promise and shaping the brand experience.

VANNOY:

I wanna go deeper on that. Steve. So we, we had my pleasure at the drive through last night on our way home. Good. went to smoking mountains with the family and did some hiking. And my daughter made sure to tell you say, cuz we she was talking about this this morning, today’s interview, and she said, you made sure and tell ’em that, that we ate here tonight. <Laugh> good.

ROBINSON:

I have a pension program. I appreciate that

VANNOY:

<Laugh>, but I wanna go un under my pleasure. Right? So I I it was, it was, it was intentional. It wasn’t flippant. Talk, I want today’s conversation to be actionable for entrepreneurs listening today that this isn’t some theory about being relational and it’s your promise. Get really gritty specific. How did, how did you train that? How did you systematically make that part of the DNA of the, of the company?

ROBINSON:

Well, it was probably, let me, let me think about the time schedule here. It was probably the mid two thousands, 2005, 2006. We’re pushing 2 billion in sales. We’ve had a very intentional run. After we’d started, free standards we’re probably up to something like 600 free standards. And we’ve spent many of the years of building those focused on how do we deliver consistent operational excellence. Every, every customer encounter foods right, delivers right transactions, accurate, et cetera, et cetera. And yet when you look at the customer data in terms of Chick-fil-A versus other competitive fast foods we were only, we, we were better, but we were just the best of a bad lot is what it really amounted to. We, we were not uniquely different.

And so we started to struggle with question, how do we position ourselves com completely in the, completely in different space than all these people around us? And and interestingly about the same time, a book came out called Blue Ocean Strategy that dealt with this very issue. Still a great book. Yeah. Still a great book. I highly recommend it. Yep. And at this, also at the same time we go to our national seminar, national convention for the Chick-fil-A operators and their fam, their, their spouses and all the staff. And for the third year in a row, Truett gets up and says, you know, I wanna make a request to you. I’ve made it two years now. I wanna make a third year. When a customer says, thank you to your team members, will you please ask your team members to say, my pleasure. And he told the story about how he’d, and he told the story for the third time, how he’d been in a Ritz Carlton, and he experienced team members saying, my pleasure.

And it wasn’t just the words, it was their body language and their eye contact and the genuineness of the experience. And I, I’ll shorten the story, simply say Dan, Kathy, his oldest son, myself, and a few others, we organized a, a, a team. Okay, let’s figure out how we’re gonna do this across 50,000 team members. How are we gonna institutionalize that kind of behavior? Yeah. And it’s not, it is not an easy task. And we benchmarked companies that had a great reputation for their brand around hospitality and service. We literally visited the stores, even visited their corporate headquarters, Nordstrom’s apple stores Zappos, Southwest Airlines, Nike et cetera. And what we learned was it does begin with the culture where the first priority is if you can possibly do it, attract and hire talent that has the gift of hospitality. Not everybody has it.

And so there was, there was things we learned about, okay, how do we help operators recruit talent, not just the work in the kitchen or produce product, but to also interact. And they have, they have a natural bent towards hospitality. Then we, then we looked at how these companies institutionalized, systematized their training. Yeah. And so the headline here, we took seven years of benchmarking other brands, doing research with customers to figure out what are the behaviors they truly noticed and value, which honed in on things like not just my pleasure, but flowers on the tables, carrying large orders, quietly, cleaning tables, refreshing drinks without asking develop the app to be store centric rather than co corporate centric, centric cetera. We then tested it in about a hundred stores for over two years, Mike, because operators thought, this is all warm fuzzy stuff. I’m just trying to get people through the restaurant.

VANNOY:

Right.

ROBINSON:

What’s it gonna really do for me? And after over two years of testing in the restaurants, the stores that were following the behavior model, the training, the processes, their same store sales increase was almost double the rest of the chain. Yeah. Which meant they were making more money. And at, at that juncture, we had the legs to go out and roll it out. So it was a seven, seven year process. So by the time we rolled it out, it wasn’t corporate forcing it down their throat. It had the backing and the endorsement of operators that said, you know, this is, this really works. It’s changed the environment in my store. We’re having more fun. People are coming back more often, da da, da, da, da, da. We’re making more money.

VANNOY:

That’s so cool. I, I, I think, I think entrepreneurs can so easily dismiss kind of some of the warm fuzziness of, of experience, right? Right. But man, my encouragement to, to employers of all sizes but especially growing small companies it, it, it’s a process, right? There’s a process for the recruiting. There’s a process for the development. There’s a there’s testing, there’s ad testing. What’s works better in this or this correct. You’re clearly a data hound, right? Reading your book that’s great. Yeah. I, I mean, I just couldn’t encourage entrepreneurs enough that, yeah, think about these things down to the every nitty gritty layer of the customer’s experience and make a process systematically design it, ab test, measure it, quantify it, and then roll it out. So it does become part of the system, right?

ROBINSON:

But it, it does start with a leader. I mean, it starts with Truett for three years telling that story. And it, and it ultimately starts with a guy who used to always tell the operators, every customer you interact with needs, encouragement. And he would ask the question, how do you know if someone needs encouragement? Look in the mirror,

VANNOY:

<Laugh>, right? We

ROBINSON:

All need encouragement. We’re we’re all human beings. And for truth, the business was also a platform to demonstrate his personal faith, his belief that Christian and biblical values really worked in business, but not via soapbox or versus on packaging, but how, how we ran the business and how we interacted with customers. And eventually operators moved being transactional oriented. They’re all in now. I mean, you, you experienced it with your daughter yesterday, right? They’re all in on dealing with every customer with an attitude of you need encouragement. I’m here to encourage you. I really am glad you’re here, and I care about this whole experience being a good experience. Now, they’re, they’re not standing there telling them that, but that’s the embedded DNA of the Chick-fil-A in culture, which you, you then have to figure out, out how do you put process and systems to it? And it’d be no different for any other entrepreneur.

VANNOY:

S Steve. You’d be, you’d be so proud. So, cause so we get, we get the food the young lady hands it to us. I get the eye contact, I get the smile, I get the, my pleasure. And I look at the girls and I’m like, see did you hear her? She said, my pleasure. And she’s like, dad, they always say, my pleasure. It’s like, there’s this builtin expect expectation down to that granular of a level. It’s, it’s, but

ROBINSON:

Just remember, again, remember Truett had to make that request of the Chick-fil-A Opera family three years in a row. And they were almost to the person, they were all skeptics. So don’t hear me say, this is easy. This is not easy. Yeah. Leaders are not leader leaders are not committed to being something more than a transactional brand. If they’re not committed to showing genuine engagement and concern for everyone, they deal with it, it won’t work. Be because what Truitt and others who were in leadership, including me, even after all these systems were in place our priority would just keep telling stories, keep telling stories, keep telling stories to illustrate, this is what it looks like. This is how people react to it. Here’s how lives are being impacted and touched. Here’s how it’s impacting better team members being attracted to the business. And oh, by the way, sales are double digit increases. I mean, my, my last two years, chick-fil-A had double digit, same store sales increases. And it wasn’t until this year that they haven’t continued to have double digit sales increases. Now, that’s not because some expensive, powerful marketing coming out of the home office. It’s because of the way people are getting treated at every individual store.

VANNOY:

Right. Right. Before I move on, Steve, I, I want to talk about the brand experience from an employment level. Before I do that, can, can you give some guidance to the, the, these, to an entrepreneur? So, so it’s the golf course manager. It’s the landscaping firm with three crews. People are grinding it out every day. Right? I think they, they probably get how to implement some of these things. How do you, it’s probably not so obvious how to quantify and measure the effectiveness in, in these experiences. Can you speak into that for us?

ROBINSON:

Yeah. before I speak to how do you measure it, let me first speak to how you potentially recreate it. You, to really understand Chick-fil-A, you have to understand who is operating these restaurants. They’re called Chick-Fil-A operators. They’re independent contractors. Legally they’re franchisees, but they’re not equity franchisees. All the stores are, the sites are picked, the site, the stores are built fully equipped by Chick-fil-A. He, they’re owned by the corporation. But if you’re a Chick-fil-A operator and we select you to run a restaurant, then you’re gonna do a, a deal where you pay a percentage off the top for the use of the brand and all the support systems and services that come with it, after all your expenses, including talent, because those team members work for you, not for Inc. After all your expenses, we’re gonna split the bottom line with you. 50 50. So half your income is coming from half net operating profit every month. Now, I, I give you that model because to me, this is actually the real operationally, this is the genius of Chick-fil-A.

VANNOY:

Yeah.

ROBINSON:

Troy figured out how to recreate himself, the entrepreneurial spirit in every restaurant. He didn’t want, he didn’t want to handhold operators or managers. He didn’t want managers. In fact, he started with managers and he quit and created this model. He didn’t wanna hand hold them. He wanted ’em to be empowered to make decisions on their own. And he wanted to be self-motivated to take care of every customer, grow sales, solve problems. And this model does it. And so you, you have in, you have restaurants now doing 7, 8, 9, $10 million a hundred, 120, 150 team members per restaurant. That, that’s not a typical fast food manager leader, right? I mean, big time business right now. And in order to do that and have that work, now, I’m getting to your question. You have to have really good systems of measurement because these people are highly empowered.

You want them to, we used to tell ’em all the time, we want you to activate and even leverage the brand for your income, but we have not invited you to reinvent the brand. So they use customer research at the store level internet as well as random phone surveys to find out about customer’s experience. Very often, if you look at the back of your receipt, you’re invited to do a survey, internet survey. They’re compiling that data on every store, every, every quarter. They’re rolling it up by market. They’re rolling it up for the whole chain. So first of all, the operator has a build in accountability system that’s customer based with that data. And they’re measuring that data’s feedback on the operational experience, the people service experience, cleanliness, the whole bit. Secondly, they’re doing research at the market level, the brand, chick-fil-A brand versus other brands.

And they can break that data down, not by store, but by market. So they can tell Atlanta versus Dallas or some other city how they’re performing, not only versus their competitors, how they’re performing versus other Chick-fil-A markets. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> or P and L’s. Part of the operator service is p and l Accounting services. So that means Chick-fil-A has complete access and transparency into the p and l at every store every month. I mean, right down to the every transaction all the cash flows going through a central bank. There’s transparency for operators as well as home office. So you have complete accountability through the financials. So the p and l doesn’t lie whether the operator’s managing cost and, and, you know, inventories and everything else, whether that, whether he or she’s doing a good job with running the store financially. Yeah. So customer data, you have brand data for the city, and you have financial data monthly and all that is not held by Chick-fil-A, Inc.

And look, look at the operator like Big Brother, all that is said to the operator every month. They know exactly how they’re doing. They know how they’re doing versus other Chick-fil-A stores. And if there is a problem at a certain level, that data will flag somebody in the Chick-fil-a corporate operational department and say, Hey, there’s something going on at this store you probably need to follow up with, with Mike to see, he seems to have the data suggests there’s a problem here. So you also, the last step is accountability with a staff member, not the other way around. And, and most franchisees organizations, franchise organizations have this huge field staff that’s creating this accountability through staff engagement, where Chick-fil-a’s accountability is first and foremost through the customer, through the brand data and through the financial data

VANNOY:

For, for people that come from that, from your world. Say what you mean by that.

ROBINSON:

So, go ahead. I’m sorry.

VANNOY:

For, for people who don’t come from the, say a retail franchise origin world, what, what do you mean by that?

ROBINSON:

What do I mean by that? Is,

VANNOY:

And the accountability model specifically?

ROBINSON:

Well, there, you want the, the store, the operator has to deliver on the brand specs, everything about it, the food, the hospitality, the speed of service, et cetera, et cetera. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>, they have to deliver on the brand specs in terms of what proper p and l looks like.

VANNOY:

Yep.

ROBINSON:

So as long as those data systems are there and they’re constantly going by the operator, they, they know exactly where, how they’re performing. And I, I won’t unpack it, but there are ranges of performance that, that put up red flags. And so if there’s an area where they’re kind of outta spec, whether it’s food related or financial related or customer feedback, they’re gonna know it and they’re gonna know that somebody in our office knows it. Now, most what I’m saying is most other franchise organizations are, are kind of heavy on the, the, the corporate field staff being the point of a primary or first, first accountability. And, and because Chick-fil-A’s got these highly motivated and engaged entrepreneur operators, the genius of what Drew and Jimmy Design was, no, we’re gonna create accountability first and foremost through data, and then we’ll deal with an operator in a consulting role if there’s a problem. Now, the last point of accountability, and probably the most powerful one is that the operator deal for both parties has a 30 day exit clause <laugh>. So the operator understands that if I’m outta spec too long on whatever the metrics is, my deal could be at risk. And so there’s, as you might imagine, there’s very little turnover and there’s very few operators when they have a problem not only get on it, but very often pick up the phone and call somebody on staff and say, I got a problem with x, I need help.

VANNOY:

Yeah.

ROBINSON:

So those, those, it’s kind of this layered system of data way down the pecking order than a field staff member last resort is the, the potential of actually losing your store 30 day notice.

VANNOY:

And Steve, the thing that I, so I’m so glad you stopped me before, just going right to data. I think maybe my recap for, for the audience today is there’s no such thing as data without systems and process. Right? And so you know, we are talking about the, the, the, my pleasure. The flowers, the, the, the, the things I think we maybe stereotypically think about a brand experience for the customer and how you have to be systematic, those and AB test and pro turn them into processes that are repeatable. But it goes, but you, you took it before that part of, part of what you said, the secret to Chick-fil-A was right down to the operator agreement, right? In the ownership structure and the incentive structure, how that’s codified into process. And that is what is wildly different than the rest of the, the, the industry. That’s correct. Yeah. And when you then, when you have process that is repeatable, now you can start measuring performance against that process, but without process, there’s nothing to measure. Am I, am I understanding this?

ROBINSON:

That, that’s correct. Unless you have process and systems and implicit in the process and systems, they’re designed to deliver some brand performance metric, whether it’s the right temperature or whatever.

VANNOY:

Right?

ROBINSON:

If you don’t have those things, then what are you measuring? <Laugh>, you, you’ve gotta know very clearly defined for your partner, in this case, chick-fil-A operator. Alright, here are the things that are, that are expected in the Chick-fil-A performance, right down to the spec on every product, the customer interaction, the hospitality experience, cleanliness, every aspect of it is, I mean, the operator manual is yay thick. And it’s very clear on this is what is expected for the sandwich, for the waffle fries for a milkshake, da da da da da da. Yeah. And so your data, your, your customer data, and by the way, I left one out, another one is mystery shoppers, where they’re actually going in and they’re, they’re ordering, they’re eating, they’re, you know, they’re even check checking temperatures. They’re, they’re observing whether the flowers, all those hospitality performance things are going on. Are there flowers? Are they cleaning tables? Are they refreshing drinks? They either are or they aren’t.

VANNOY:

Right?

ROBINSON:

They’re no different than their, they’re either two pickles on the sandwich or their arm

VANNOY:

<Laugh>. Right?

ROBINSON:

It’s exactly the same principle. And you measure it. And, and operators will, when they understand what the requirements are, the expectations are

The partner who’s highly motivated, engaged, and empowered will figure out how to deliver it. And I think without getting too, too, in all the weeds of this, Mike, I think the key message for your audience is, is if you have a distributed business brand business, the most important decision you’re making is your operating model, your leadership model. Now, that doesn’t necessarily have to be like Chick-fil-A’s, but ideally, if you wanna deliver a great brand experience, you have to have on the ground who are engaged or are motivated to be engaged, who are rewarded when things go well and are, are empowered to solve problems without having to phone somebody at the home office. And that’s what Chick-Fil-A has. These, these, these Chick-fil-A independent operators are highly independent, but they understand the box top as the brand standards they have to deliver, and they’re measured against it.

VANNOY:

Steve, I think you’re spot on. And, and, and whether you’re, whether you’re a three location business trying to go to a hundred and, and trying to get scale, or you’re a one location company, maybe you’re a virtual company you’re, you can’t, you can’t scale without those core decisions of a leadership process and an organizational structure that will, that will align to that scale. Right?

ROBINSON:

Right. Right. And I’ll give you, I’ll repeat myself, but I think it’s a key principle. I stated earlier, I dunno how he did it. In fact, I would suggest probably genius that was divinely inspired. But Truett and Jimmy designed and operator model that was at the core was designed to recreate, recreate Truit as an entrepreneur, engaged, caring about every guest. Because as far as Truitt was concerned, every store, every restaurant, every customer engagement reflected on his reputation. Not just the nick, not just the name Chick-fil-A. Right? Right. But, and he made it very clear, operators, you, you, you represent me. And so he, in fairness to them, he gave them a deal where they could work very, very hard and behaving like him and be rewarded for I love it. Now, you know, in the case of Chick-fil-A, the net of that is that, you know, 40 years plus now you got operators who are making a, a very healthy <laugh> income. And in the context of an operating model, there probably nobody else in the fast food business is ever gonna attempt to copy because it’s so generous. Right. Unbelievable. It’s unbelievably generous. And, and I, and I think for the people watching and listening it, if you really wanna highly engage relational brand, you gotta, you gotta f you gotta think about the issue generosity. Are you gonna allow your local leadership to engage, not just to deliver the brand standards, but to be generous when generosity is called. For

VANNOY:

Steve, what’s just jumping out to me here is I, so I, I, I, I own three hair salons and I’m trying to grow, but I chafe at the word process or systems because it’s all about connections and it’s personal. Yes. And it’s not intuitive that we can systematize that level of engagement. Yes. But when literally create a training process around saying, making eye contact and saying, my pleasure. When you literally train the exact technique to use when performing, you know, I’m not, I’m not a customer, obviously, so, but <laugh>, the exact process is where to stand the words to say you can, in fact, you can. Yeah,

ROBINSON:

You can do. That’s exactly right.

VANNOY:

Yeah. Yeah. I, I, I’m looking at the clock Steve, I, I, I think I wanna shift this over to, so I, I, I love this, and as a marketer, I’d love to talk marketing with you for more time than you, you would ever have, I’m sure. But speak to the, the employment brand, because to me, you know, in, in, in why the, I think probably a lot of people listening today you know, see us as a payroll, human resources company, which we are. And any advice in a conversation like this that helps them grow their business from a, from an operations, from a marketing standpoint, great. But to the context of hiring the right people developing them, training them there’s, there’s a brand experience. Just like there’s a brand experience from the customer, from the very first interaction to how they pay, how they consume, how they dispose of the food, how they exit the, the parking lot. That that’s all a brand experience. Same thing for an, an employee from the employment application to the onboarding, to the training, to, dare I say, through 34, 35 years of retirement, can, can, what, what, what’s your guidance here?

ROBINSON:

Well, I’ll go all the way back to my last interview with Truitt. I won’t unpack the whole story, it’s in my book. But he said something that kind of floored me. I was into my fifth month of interviewing and, and I, I’m doing it stealth. And I asked Truett, I said, what are you looking for in the ideal marketing candidate, Truett? Cause they didn’t have a marketing department at the time. I was director of marketing Six Flags over Georgia. And he kind of threw me when he says, I have absolutely no idea. All I know is I don’t want to do it. But, but then he said but what I really care about, and I’ve said this already, is who you are. I don’t know. I can trust you and we have fun together. But then he added this, he said, the most important decision we make here is who we invite into the business.

I, I I don’t know that many companies, including, including even the one I was working for at the time, thought that way. And and his behavior and Jimmy’s behavior lived up to that, the due diligence then, and still now, that Chick-Fil-A has about recruiting, vetting and selecting talent. I think Truit figured out, I want to attract people that have a values DNA like mine. He said, we don’t, we don’t train culture here. We hire it. Well, that means you gotta really do your homework to get a sense of who somebody is without. And you just, you can’t discriminate, you can’t break the law. You just gotta spend time with them. Yeah. And ask questions and get to know, you know, get to know how they spend their free time and what do they, you know, what, what do they like to read if they’re married?

What, what do their, what do they like to do with their spouse, et cetera. And you start to get a sense of what’s important to somebody. And that’s what True. And Jimmy designed into their their HR process was the go beyond skillset and or competency and get into the whole area of, of personal chemistry and the, the ability to develop fellowship and, and be a team player have character they could trust, therefore empower you. So my my point is, leaders have to decide what, what are the, what, what are the dna around purpose and values that you want to try to identify in potential talent? Because it’s a lot easier to attract that, that, that those, those DNA values than it is to train. And they apply that to the selection of operators. So on the whole, you get a, you get a great operator who’s, who’s not only competent, but has great character, has great chemistry with people.

Well, what happens? They attract great people. They attract more of them, they keep ’em longer. They have lower turnover, they develop talent. Now over, over half of the new operators every year in the Chick-fil-A system are coming from existing stores. They’ve grown up in the business. So this issue of value D values, D n a, and being very clear about what those are, and then how do you get a handle on in, within your recruiting and your vetting process, how are you gonna handle whether somebody has those values? And it, I’ve already said it takes time, and you gotta look beyond competency. Most companies stop at competency.

VANNOY:

Right. you know what, it’s interesting, just like my question around how do you get data? Your answer had to back us up to process, right? You gotta have process before you can have data. In, you can’t have employment culture alignment without knowing what the culture you want is. And you can’t know what the culture you want is if you haven’t like, really vetted what are our values. Right? Right. That’s

ROBINSON:

Right. So,

VANNOY:

So

ROBINSON:

Give an example. I’ll give you an example of, I’m not gonna get into detail, but I’ll give you example. One betting question that was commonly used, and I loved it and I used it

After you’ve spent quality time with a candidate, whether it’s an operator, candidate or staff qu candidate, you don’t verbalize this question, but I would ask myself this question. I learn it from Tru what I want my children or my grandchildren working for this person. Okay. In other words, we become who we hang around with, we become what we read and who we spend time with. Yeah. And can I see my grandchildren or my children being a better person because they’re working for this person sitting across from me? My experience is your intuition kicks in really quick, and you get a yes or a no pretty quick.

VANNOY:

Yeah. Yeah.

ROBINSON:

That’s, that’s an example,

VANNOY:

Steve. So speak to the other side of it. So hiring the right people. So first you gotta define what your values are and what the culture you’re seeking. Then you find candidates that fit it. Yeah. So there’s a, there’s a, a prerequisite to, to, to even developing a good hiring process. I, I loved you know, it was, it was kind of jarring how Truett, you know, said, Hey, when, when you were in your five and a half month interview hey, I, I want you to be here until one of us dies. Right? I mean, there was this mentality of commitment,

ROBINSON:

Marriage. We call it a marriage.

VANNOY:

Yeah. there is a reality that you’re gonna have, especially in a big organization. You’re gonna have some turnover. How, how, how do you, how did, what’s your guidance, maybe not Chick-fil-A specific, however you want to answer it. What’s your guidance on how to have this marriage, long-term commitment mentality at the same time holding a high bar for performance? Because the, that just cause you’ve committed doesn’t mean you have to tolerate bad performance or bad behavior. Yeah,

ROBINSON:

That’s absolutely correct. You don’t I, I’ll just give you the headline. I, for me, and I think for the Chick-fil-A organization, that’s, we got bigger I think many of our leaders would say yes to this. We kept great talent by giving them new opportunities and challenges. Not always a promotion, but giving them new assignments, different assignments outside may, maybe outside of their skill where they’re learning, they’re learning new things, they’re developing new skills, they’re developing their leadership. So I, I loved to, and they’re still doing it, moving people around. I mean, I was at the home office a week or two ago. I bet you, I’m guessing, but I’m probably pretty accurate. I bet you have the people that work for me in the marketing group, when I left, it was about 220 people. I bet you over half of ’em are in another department right now.

VANNOY:

Mm.

ROBINSON:

So you give people the opportunity to grow. Now, the ones who really grow and really contribute, you, you do promote, and they do increase their earning power. And those who can’t perform or can’t keep up with the growth of the business, you may have to invite them to find a career somewhere else. And I had to do that, that that happens. Doesn’t happen often, but it does happen. But I think the greatest way to keep talent long term, like Truett wanted, was don’t ever let the job get boring. And, and if the job itself is not evolving in terms of constant innovation and change and move them into, give ’em another assignment, move them, put ’em on another team, put ’em in another department. I mean, my successor started in it, and I, I recruited him to help develop our IT infrastructure around customer facing, which ultimately led to the Chick-fil-A one app. But he, he’s a fast learner had time with Accenture, and he was one of three people that were candidates taking my place. But he is a good illustration of, of a guy who, his background was not marketing, but he got the opportunity to come into marketing, learn it, contribute uniquely to our group, and he’s nest and Mo.

VANNOY:

Well, it ties back to how Truett interviewed you, right. Searching for the right people, not the right competencies. Right. If you start, start with people, not competencies, competencies can be developed in grown. It’s hard to change people at their core, right?

ROBINSON:

That’s right.

VANNOY:

So speak. So I, so I say that, and I mean that I also don’t want to dismiss competencies because, and so, I mean a, a a marketer in today’s era, I mean the, the competencies required to, so, so, so the core principles of, of marketing are relatively unchanged, right? Yes. tools have changed wildly and continue to evolve wildly and correct the tools yesterday or not the tools of today. How do you, how do you approach competency in the mix for Yeah, go ahead.

ROBINSON:

Well one I just mentioned, giving people new assignments where they learn something, they have to learn something new in order to do the assignment.

VANNOY:

Yeah.

ROBINSON:

Two, offering continuous, continuous education opportunities. I mean, we, beyond moving people around, we, we were constantly offering people chances to learn from other organizations, go to advanced education in colleges, go to seminars doing, go do an internship with another business so they learn a skillset. We needed the willingness to invest time and money into somebody to learn, learn new skills, and almost overwhelm them with the opportunities to do that. So if, if they’re not doing it, then you, then you, you kind of learn, okay, I got a problem here. I don’t, I I need to learn in my organization. And I got somebody who’s not a learner. Doesn’t happen often, but occasionally does. So I, I think those are the two biggest contributors to learning, continuing to evolve with your skillset is moving people around, but then giving them personal development, educational opportunities outside of the business, whether it’s through academics or internships or in mentoring, relationships, whatever.

VANNOY:

I love that. So I, I know you got a hard stop coming up, so maybe I’ll just touch on one more topic and let’s talk about you, you talk about it in the book, so it’s hopefully not too painful a subject. But what about really big lessons? Can you, can you share your, your $2 million mistake story? Yeah.

ROBINSON:

I, I think you’ve got it on the screen here. I was actually fortunate to have this experience early in my career. My second year there I, I ran a national promotion, and I, quite frankly, I learned real quick, I was too aggressive and I was too aggressive in the context of lack of knowledge. I didn’t have enough experience, I shouldn’t have done it. And it went over budget, 2 million. Now, this is when Chick-fil-a’s $120 million business. So 2 million bucks was a big deal.

VANNOY:

Big deal.

ROBINSON:

It was also 1982 when we were in midst of a national financial crisis. This, this mistake was part of, not the only thing, but part of contributing to Chick-fil-A, our executive committee going off site to deal a cash flow problem. And we not only worked on the cash flow problem, but we walked out of there with our corporate purpose. Yeah. I often think crises or mistakes ought to force us to step back, be humble, be objective. Now, what can I learn from this? And for Chick-fil-A was transformative because as a leadership group, we wrote the corporate purpose to glorify God by being a faithful steward of all is entrusted to us. And to have a positive influence on all that come in contact with Chick-fil-A. We wrote it in two days. Now the, this specific mistake result in, in us deciding we’re not gonna market.

I’m giving you the headline. We’re not gonna market Chick-fil-A the way other fast food chains market. This was a coupon based promotion. We decided we’re never gonna do coupons and discounting again. We stopped. Yep. And we completely inverted the marketing model. We made an operator centric model rather than a corporate centric marketing model. We empowered the operators. We gave them the resources and the ideas for them to build the business, not controlling everything out of Atlanta. And this mistake is, was, was the catalyst for what eventually developed what I call renegade marketing. Whatever the marketing issue of strategy is, we were considering, if it looks and smells anything like the rest of the industry, we’re not gonna do it. And so, cows campaign’s a great example. We, we, we decided we’re not gonna show food. We’re not gonna show price. We’re not gonna try to just communicate.

We want your business, we want your money. We decided we’re gonna campaign that’ll make people smile and make the brand memorable. And because the reality is you can show a chicken sandwich and change the logo and it, you can’t tell whose it is. So I, I, I’m a great believer in don’t don’t throw people out when they make a mistake. Give ’em a chance to step back, be humble, think, strategize. What did you learn? What is the bigger implication on the business? I already told you, in the case of Chick-fil-A, it was, it was transforming for the business, and it was transforming for me and my team.

VANNOY:

Yeah. And Steve, a couple things that I heard when, when listed when reading your book, listen, you speak here the, the, the approach to hiring the right people, not just the competencies, the, the, the example that Truett set, that you weren’t shown the door when you made this mistake. No,

ROBINSON:

No. In fact, I went to Jimmy and I apologize, within about a week, I knew I’d made a real big mistake. And he said he said, don’t worry about it. He said, I was part of it, I approved it. And he said, besides, we just invested $2 million in your education, you’ll never make that mistake again.

VANNOY:

Well, and then humility,

Humility cascaded, because it was not just how they treated you, but you know, you’re kind of a legendary marketer. And I, one of the things that really jumps out to me is you know, from the hospitality to the cows, to the processes, to the, the, the, the data-centric approach that you take. It’s not Atlanta up on headquarters on high telling everybody how it’s gonna be done because you’re the smartest guy in the room. You almost take the opposite approach. I mean, you give all the credit away to everyone else. And, and it’s a decentralized operator centric marketing approach, correct. Right.

ROBINSON:

That’s absolutely. Here, here’s, here’s where here’s where I netted out. And this mistake contributed to it. Chick-Fil-A, customers don’t care who the CMO is. <Laugh>, they don’t, they don’t even care who the CEO is.

VANNOY:

All

ROBINSON:

They care about is what kind of experience do they have at that brand, at that restaurant. They, they don’t even care who came up with the cow campaign. All they care about is they enjoy the jokes.

VANNOY:

That’s right. That’s right.

ROBINSON:

So it’s not about me. It’s not, it’s quite frankly, it’s not about any leader if they’ll really step back and be objective about it. The question is, am I contributing to creating an environment where people can thrive? And I learned it from Truett, and then I just tried to make that happen in, in my, in my sphere of influence.

VANNOY:

Well, Steve, from my seat, you, you did. I’ll give you the platform. It would seem seem ironic to, to do so, but I know we’re at time. I, I highly recommend the book. It’s great. The, the, the, the, the combination of personal story along with really good practical advice for how to think about growing a business. Is there anything you’d like to say about how you help clients today post Chick-fil-A?

ROBINSON:

Well, I I did the book, I’d still do some public speaking. I have a website, s robinson consulting.com. I have resources there. I have some, I have some articles there. I have some other blog, blog broadcasts. The book is still on the market at Amazon and, and other resources. So I’m honored that people enjoy the book and they’re still buying it. I hope your audience will give it a shot.

VANNOY:

Yeah. Highly, highly recommend. And Steve, just, it was, it was a pleasure. It was a real pleasure. It was a pleasure reading book. Getting, when you read someone’s book you feel like you get to know them, it’s little unfair cuz they don’t get to know you perhaps. But today did nothing but validate every, every word. So really, really enjoyed our time that this hour flew by for me.

ROBINSON:

Same, same here. I enjoyed doing it.

VANNOY:

All right. Thank you so much for joining and thanks everyone else for joining. Until next week, if there’s anything we can do to help you with payroll, human resources, compliance, tax filing staying compliant while building a great team to grow your business by all means, let us know. Otherwise, until next week, talk to you soon.

ROBINSON:

Have a great day.