Every Second Counts
“Every Second Counts”. This mantra is displayed consitently on several episodes of the TV Show “The Bear”. Those 3 words stuck with me after I finished season 2. The statement directs the kitchen’s “chefs” to a common goal, that is delivering the best dishes with the highest quality standards in terms of taste, presentation, temperature and experience.
The show’s kitchen team is full of people with different backgrounds, personal goals, family issues, insecurities and personality traits. This layout is frequently encountered in a every project team. The human factor is a really complex one. Trying to deeply understand each team member’s dimensions is time consuming, and when we are running on a tight schedule it is simply not feasible.
Proposing a direction with a simple mantra, statement, can help align different personalities towards a goal, that in this case is delivering the project artifacts — Dishes — under the highest standards. A long the way there will be friction, but if every team member has a sense of purpose they will eventually focus on the task at hand. Providing positive feedback on those tasks, on time, reinforces the mantra and the common goal. For example, preparing a new dish entails at least the following phases:
- Research
- Meal Preps
- Plate Composition
- Tasting
During each of these, timely feedback is necessary to guide the kitchen’s “chefs”. This is a great way to show everyone’s time is valued. If there is a good sense that effort is appreciated, communication will become more fluid and suggestions to improve the process will organically come up. Better ingredients, shorter cooking time, portion sizes, etc. The same goes for any project. It is all about solidifying the idea that we are in it together.
So, what’s your mantra?
