This is related to my bakery-business, so I hope it's okay to post it here in F&E though it's not number-related. Last time I wrote about the bakery was about the struggles that we faced in the last months, and this is closely related to that.
@galenkp asked about near-perfect experiences, and as I started the comment and it grew longer and longer and longer, I took advantage of his offer to tag him in a post instead of a comment.
Just today I had a team meeting that was near perfect. After 2 months of grinding, whipping , reprimanding and basic motivating, it seems like I finally had found the way to have everyone work well together again.
There was a lot of critical analysis in the last months, and a lot of direct words among the team. Necessary, unfortunately, as they kept screwing up. The main baker was very discontent with his 2 assistant bakers, since they didn't seem to listen to what he was trying to teach them (after I had had serious conversation with him about his mistakes), and was very frustrated - rightly so, but that didn't make for a productive work environment.
So, last week I tasked the assistants with writing down both their mistakes and what they did exceptionally good. I told them to write everything down, mistakes in technique, handling of dough & loaves, attitude, preparation of of mind as well as body (napping before night shift), and that they'll have to present that in the meetings so the main baker and the administrator can counter-check.
One of the assistants was struggling privately as well, and was de-motivated as for quite a while he didn't get a raise. I had told him that as soon as he consistently delivers, I will gladly raise his salary. But he never came through, and yet, he needed to make more. So I told him that we'll do the opposite - I'll pay him 15% more per night, but he has to deliver. He has to improve, and he has to be worth that extra pay.
It seems like both measures worked nicely as both of them responded very well during the meeting today. It was incredibly productive because the two assistants had done the task and were able to contribute valuable knowledge to the discussion about how to change the way we guide the sourdough, in order to get a more consistent outcome.
They were able to list every thing that went wrong with them last week, and the main baker just nodded as they not only named the mistake, but right away said how they think to improve that based on what he had told them. I could tell that he was very content and more than anything relieved about this.
The drag is not the mistakes, it's the resistance against improving. Having to say the same thing over and over again. Not being heard. Not being considered. Mistakes will still happen, negligence and lack of concentration are a long-term challenge that we're facing with the assistants, for years now (and yes, they are improving). But knowing that they are in fact listening, and having them repeat all the lessons again every Monday in the meetings seems to be a good way to jog those brains.
We laughed so much today. It finally felt like a real team again, like that mini-community that we have become over the years, facing all weathers together. There are still many things to work on, and I had to weigh in from time to time. A perfect meeting would've been them solving everything without needing. But it was close. We're getting there.