This February marks 25 years of starting my professional journey and I had the joy of celebrating this milestone with a special colleague of my yester-years. Chef George George was our Executive Chef at the pre-opening team of the Trident Cochin, The Oberoi Group.
I met him at Cochin yesterday and to celebrate and recount our memories, he treated me to a lovely meal, leadership lessons and abundant kindness, at the Trident’s Travancore Restaurant.
I have an indelible memory of a leadership action he had taken, during the time I’d decided to leave the hotel, to pursue my further education. Chef George had requested me for a meeting to seek feedback. Here I was, with about 2 years of work experience and he wanted to know anything he could enhance about his work with his team of Chefs. Soon after, he went on to become Executive Chef of the Oberoi Grand at Calcutta, and led the leadership transition of staff across the property, shaping the new face of front line employees, in an exemplary style.
Here are 3 highlights from our conversation, that I’d share with anyone who seeks to get better at leadership:
1. Learning comes from unexpected experiences, and especially as leaders, it is valuable to leverage feedback as a source of learning.
2. Feedback is a gift, and as a leader seeking feedback from the team, making it psychologically safe for the giver, makes a huge difference.
3. If you lead with genuine intent to get better every day, your simplest of actions are remembered, even 25 years later!
The conversations and calls we made to our colleagues from those times, led us to joyfully making plans for a team reunion this year, to celebrate 25 years of our hotel’s opening. This phase not just launched careers for a nearly 100 member team, it is recounted as one of the times of our careers when we learnt what it was like to be led well and to lead well!
#TeamTTCO #25YearCareerMilestone #LastingLeadershipLessons
Hospitality Enthusiast
2moSo well deserved 👏🏻