Restaurant Leadership: Why Working Harder Won’t Grow Your Restaurant or Cafe

There comes a point in every leader’s career when “doing more” stops being the answer.

When I was first promoted to General Manager, I thought I knew exactly why I had earned the job. I could work every position. I gave exceptional customer service. I’d stay late, come in early, and work whatever hours were needed. If there was a problem, I solved it. Leadership could count on me. When I was in the building, everything went smoothly.

I believed that’s what great leadership looked like.

Within a year, I had taken one of the lowest-performing restaurants in our portfolio and turned it into one of the highest-performing ones.

How? I controlled everything. Every decision. Every order. Every hire and promotion. Every inventory. Every schedule. I solved every problem. I knew every regular. I worked 70 hour weeks. I went into the cafe every day.

It’s not surprising that I eventually burned out. In fact, I left the restaurant industry entirely.

A couple of years later, I was invited back under new leadership. That’s when I met one of my mentors, Dan.

Early on, he said something I’ll never forget:

“You’ve been operating like an Assistant Manager. I’m going to teach you how to operate like a General Manager.”

Dan took me under his wing. He put me in charge of a small operation in the company, and we met several times a month to talk about growth, leadership, and the problems that I was encountering. Eventually, he put me at the helm of the top location. He had one rule:

“Colby doesn’t work more than 50 hours a week”.

It was radical. The expectation at the time was 55 hours for all of our managers. And there was always something that came up requiring an extra few hours, or an extra shift per week. It was just part of the job.

But Dan understood something I didn’t: A well-rested leader makes better decisions, develops better teams, keeps better standards, and can see the vision, even if things are a little tough in the moment.

Burned out leaders… they’re on edge.

They make short term decisions

They don’t develop

They do everything themselves

They focus all of their energy on today, every day

Every interruption feels personal

Every problem is another emergency

What’s the difference in a team’s performance under those two types of leadership?

In my case, it was $167,000.00. That’s how much more the restaurant made that year. No radical changes, no silver bullets. Just a well-rested leader with boundaries, steering, developing, moving the ball down the field 10 yards at a time.

Why Restaurant Leadership Changes as You Grow:

I had to learn that the qualities that made me a successful Assistant Manager weren’t the same qualities that would make me a successful General Manager. As an Assistant Manager, value comes from personal accomplishments. As a General Manager, value comes from what a team can accomplish under leadership.

Those are two very different jobs.

The irony is that restaurants reward people for being indispensable, then promote them into roles where their success depends on making themselves less indispensable.

Nobody explains that transition. So we keep trying to win the new job with the habits that earned us the old one.

I believe that has lead to a huge loss of talent in our industry.

How Better Restaurant Leadership Creates Capacity

Now I ask leaders a simple question: “If you had two extra days off every week, what would you do with them?”

The question isn’t really about days off. It’s a test to see if they have taken the time to define where they’re going.

Most people I ask this question honestly say “I don’t know”. Without a clear picture of what they’re building toward, they default to the thing they’ve always done: work harder.

Dan didn’t teach me to work less. He taught me to protect the capacity required to lead well.

Build Your Restaurant Leadership Around a Vision

Having a vision helps you see which problems are important, and which ones are speed bumps.

Whether your goal is two days off every week, taking a vacation, reaching a financial milestone, or opening a second location. It doesn’t matter. The whole point of owning a business is that you decide what success looks like!

So whatever it is, define it.

Then build a roadmap. Not, “What do I need to do to get there?” But, “What kind of leader do I need to become to get there?”

The answer usually isn’t working harder. It’s things like:

• Developing stronger leaders

• Delegating meaningful responsibility

• Creating clear expectations

• Building systems that help your team succeed without depending on you for every decision

That’s how restaurants and cafes become sustainable.

And that’s how owners reclaim the capacity to think, grow, and enjoy the business they worked so hard to build.

If you’re feeling stuck in the cycle of doing everything yourself, start by creating a vision for where you want to go. Once you can see the destination, you can begin leading your restaurant toward it.

And if you’d like an experienced operator in your corner while you make that journey, I’m here to help.

Rooting For You,

-Colby

About the Author:

Colby Behrends is the founder of Noble Restaurant Success, a San Diego-based leadership coaching and advisory practice for independent restaurant owners. He helps operators develop stronger leaders, improve accountability, and build businesses that don’t depend on one person to function.

Learn more at NobleRestaurantSuccess.com