As I am sure most of you know already, as of April 1, 2011 my Restaurateur was terminated from Chipotle Mexican Grill. What you might not know, however, is the degree to which he served as an admired and cherished member of our restaurant. Please, allow me now to elucidate. I can easily say that every day under his guidance generated the respect and adoration of the entire team. As our Restaurateur, he not only committed himself to cultivating the goals and ambitions of those around him, but also he influenced and inspired the passions and desires that lay dormant in most employees; awakening in each of us an appetite for achievement and a demand for success. These traits, which I believe appropriately earned him the title of Restaurateur, made him an asset to our team and a blessing as our friend. Under his guidance, our team was proud, determined, and strong. Since his removal, we’re left disheartened, shaken, and confused. Some of you, I’m sure, have imagined your restaurant as a living, breathing entity; capable of flourishing or perishing depending on the attention you give to it. When they fired him, they ripped the heart out of this restaurant, and now I’m watching as the light in its eyes slowly fades. Upon hearing the news, the majority of crew members were paralyzed with grief. Those that could muster an affective response burst out either in anger or in tears. This emotional response alone, which days later continues to resonate in the character and atmosphere of the entire store, seriously calls into question the motives and rationalization of those in charge of the decision. Moreover, I wish to stress the fact that even after earnest and open conversations with several members of the team, I have yet to find anyone who is in any way relieved by his absence, truly understanding of the situation, or any response really that mirrors the sentiment that he acted as the problematic or ineffectual leader that we are being told he was. Furthermore, this contradiction, in effect, has not surprisingly been accompanied by a simple yet notoriously elusive question – Why?
To answer this, I turned to two individuals: first is our Team Leader and second is our Team Director. To begin with, I cannot emphasis enough how helpful, sympathetic, understanding, and compassionate our TL has been throughout this whole ordeal. From the moment it happened, he has done his very best to explain the decision in a manner that is satisfactory for himself and everyone else involved in the decision, and he has worked with us both in the store and outside the store to insure that we are coping and adjusting in the necessary ways; actions which truly demonstrate the integrity and sincerity we pride ourselves on here at Chipotle. Interestingly, as he attempted to articulate the words that were supposed to represent the explanations we had so desperately been seeking, I think even he was aware at how vacant and amiss they seemed. Therefore, despite how earnest and considerate he attempted to be in rationalizing the decision, his justifications were ultimately bankrupt, which left us still searching for concrete and sustainable answers. Conversely, his elegance in approaching the situation has only served to highlight the calloused and deficient response demonstrated by our TD. For days after the termination, he ignored us. At first, he failed to contact the store and, moreover, we were unable to contact him. Most disheartening is that he hasn’t taken the opportunity to visit the store to check on the people so directly influenced by his decision. Furthermore, not even our TL was fully aware of his plan for helping the store recover from this tragedy.
Officially speaking, our Restaurateur had been fired because he did not empower his crew. Certain members of upper management were under the impression that he had failed his crew because he failed to instill in each and every one of us a sense of ownership and a confidence in achieving goals.
The fact of the matter is our Chipotle is a hard restaurant. We do a much higher volume of sales than most other restaurants in the area, meaning that our “slow periods” are what most see happening in their peak hours, and, thus, you can only imagine what our peak hours look like. Moreover, we’re located in an older building that is smaller than most restaurants and is completely devoid of basic conveniences such as fax lines and readily available parking spaces. This is not to say, of course, that I don’t recognized how busy and difficult other restaurants are to manage, just that this restaurant, in particular, is different in a variety of ways that make many of the general expectations of other stores unfeasible here. This is not only something that our TD disbelieved, but adamantly rejected. Therefore, he continued to demand adherence to certain rules that were not only ineffective, but in certain cases downright harmful to restaurant. Therefore an emotional and mental struggle began as our Restaurateur desperately attempted to show him the realities of our restaurant while he continued to dismiss them. Interestingly, our TL, who has spent a great deal of time actually in our restaurant, tends to recognize and act sympathetically towards the discrepancies our particular branch endures; however, even now I find our TD has a naive conception of these matters, which has really drawn a line between his managerial decisions and our day-to-day activities. Moreover, the constant conflict between the interests of the company and the interests of the restaurant has made it impossible for the crew to find a sense of empowerment. It seemed every other week we had a new way of doing things and a new technique that was unhelpful and frustrating. And that was exactly the reaction of the crew to these ever-changing rules, frustration. However, and I cannot stress this enough, this was all despite the attempts made by our Restaurateur to maintain the crew’s positive attitudes and eagerness to try out the new procedures. Moreover, it was only through the empowerment instilled in the crew by him that they were able to thoughtfully question the motivation for these unreal expectations. But as far as we could tell this was a losing battle. Eventually, he was removed from the store, leaving behind all of us feeling even more betrayed, again confused by what upper management could possibly be thinking, and, sadly, wondering to what degree we might have caused this to happen. If only we had listened to him more, done the dishes that much faster, or agreed to needlessly throw away every burrito with a torn tortilla, maybe then he could have stayed…
Okay fine, what’s done is done…but what’s next?
Days later, my TD finally returned my calls. I asked him his reasons and he recited the official explanation. I then asked him what his plan was and he seemed vaguely sure he could get us some additional support by some time or another in the near future, maybe; he was not altogether clear of when or by whom this would happen though. One thing he was sure of, however, was that I would be the one assuming leadership of the store. He said after my interview for Apprentice he realized that I had the confidence and abilities to guide the restaurant in a direction that my Restaurateur was never able to do. He said that upon hearing how proud and confident I was of my crew, and how sure I was that they were proud and confident in themselves, he knew that I would make a great GM. My response was that any confidence I or the crew had in ourselves and each other was a direct result of the leadership previously provided by my Restaurateur, and I wondered in my mind if he’d realized that he just undermined his entire explanation for his dismissal. As a reply, he insolently conjectured that he was sure we would understand and be better off in a couple months, even if it seemed unlikely now; a very difficult response to contend, despite its being so unsatisfying.
Regardless of our disdain for the decision, it has happened. Regardless of our desire to have our old Restaurateur with us, he’s gone. Regardless of our pleas against our TD's misconceptions and apathy, those sentiments won out. He ever so candidly made a decision that completely undermined the intentions and ambitions of every single person in that entire restaurant. Moreover, he did so without any plan for ameliorating the situation and afterwards ignored the broken state that our restaurant has been left in. Now, he expects me to pick up the pieces and assume leadership of the crew. Actually, the one thing he got right in all of this is that I am, in fact, entirely confident in my abilities to be GM for this store. With the help of my team, I know with a lot of hard work we would be able to rebuild what was taken from us – but why would I want to? Why would I clean up after his irresponsible and thoughtless decision that I so strongly detest? Why would I work so hard to counter the notions of betrayal and apprehension that he has instilled in the crew? Why would I choose to work under a group of leaders that would so negligently cause this to happen? And, most importantly, why would I do all of this just to end up in the same hopeless and impossible position that my Restaurateur was in? No amount of hard work and high performance on behalf of me or my crew is going to reconcile the distorted and ill-founded opinions of of my TD and whoever else in the upper echelon of corporate leadership share in those opinions. How’s that for feeling empowered? The only thing that I can see that will effect such change is to give my TD and TL the opportunity to experience first-hand how this restaurant truly runs. So long as they happily rely on me to correct the damages caused by removing our Restaurateur, but hesitate to reconsider the corporate agenda that wedged him out, we’re not getting at the cause of the illness, we’re merely treating symptoms.
So, in my best attempt to cause awareness to this illness, I am walking out of this store. Please understand, this is not a decision made in haste or hysteria, but rather it is made only after many sleepless and thought-filled nights. Please understand, I do not walk out proud of my action, but sorrowful and embarrassed by a corporation that has so blatantly disregarded the welfare and morale of the individuals on which it is founded. Please understand, although I’m sure they will say that I am acting out of cowardice and selfishness, I am neither scared of being a leader for this team, nor do I think my decision is purely self-interested. Please understand, I honestly believe only this type of action can truly call to attention the needs and desires of a particular crew that has lost faith in an entire company. Please understand, although I am admittedly disgruntled by this situation, I am not merely a disgruntled employee, as which I’m sure they’ll refer to me. And most importantly, please understand that this restaurant and the people in it are the most important things in the world to me. I am who I am today because of them, and I cherish each and every moment we’ve experienced together. Now it is their opportunity to have their voices heard. And as much as it might see like I am turning my back on them, I promise you that I’m merely stepping aside so that all of you might have the opportunity to hear those voices.
This is what opportunity looks like.
On that note, I somewhat respectfully end my three-year relationship with Chipotle Mexican Grill. I would like to thank everyone for all of your hard work and I wish you well in future endeavors.