Season 1, Episode 3: From the Kitchen to Consulting with Shannon Waters
A career as a chef in many well known restaurants in the country brought Shannon Waters into her true calling as a consultant for opening restaurants. It was a natural transition from the kitchen to the office when she realized she had a true talent for creating the systems that need to be put in place to get a restaurant started. When she is taking a well deserved break from getting some amazing restaurants off the ground and running, you will find her… well, you won’t find her. She will most likely be off the grid doing something in the great outdoors where no call or email will find them.
Guest Shannon Waters is the lead consultant at Pilot Light consulting, where she focuses on providing restaurants with a successful opening experience. She is also a founding member of The Proof Collective, a women-run forum for the food industry. Host Jordan Lacenski is the founder and Chief Innovation Officer at Brandboss Creative, and co-founder of SheWolf Collaborative.
Host: Jordan Lacenski
Guest: Shannon Waters
Show Notes:
“I try to be true self, I try to be like my own personality, you know? I think that's why people hire people like us.”- Jordan and Shannon talk about being your true self in your business
“How did I get here? Why am I doing this? Who is this for?”- Shannon shares the big turning point in her career path from chef to consultant
“If you want to make money, you have to be working at all times and if you want freedom, that's great... you're not gonna have a job.”- Jordan and Shannon talk about some of the misunderstandings of entrepreneurship
“But all of a sudden you start to factor in all the things that make your business go, which is a Google domain, which is four emails, which is your actual internet, your wifi, your domain space.” - Jordan and Shannon discuss overhead without a brick and mortar
“The fact that they do what they do in a very opposite way for me has saved us a lot of circumstances, but it also brings a perspective that I would never think of.“- we chat about working with personality types opposite our own
“We will go places that we purposely know do not have cell phone service and just and go wherever that may be.”- Shannon shares what she likes to do when she checks out
“We experienced a really wonderful fire and it was opening weekend”- Shannon shares a wild story about a restaurant opening gone wrong
“Even if I never pay myself at least all of this is for me and at least all of the the struggle and all of the learning experiences were mine.”- We dig into why being your own boss is a hard yet rewarding experience, even when you don’t pay yourself (much)
“Working on yourself is working on your business”- From folding yoga mats to a walk outside, we talk about self care
“I’m controlling your mind right now.”- Using business tools for relationships and learning relationship advice from business
Links:
Pilot Light Consulting: http://pilotlightconsulting.com/
Proof Collective: http://www.theproofcollective.com/
She Wolf Collaborative: https://shewolfco.co/
Brandboss Creative: https://www.brandbosscreative.com/
Also mentioned:
The Riddler: https://www.theriddlersf.com/
Sixteen Personalities: https://www.16personalities.com/
Asana: https://wwww.asana.com/
Basecamp: https://basecamp.com/
Quotes:
“We actually shine through versus everyone else that's like, ‘well I have to wear the suit’ or ‘I have to look this way’. And I don’t have to look like anything.” -Shannon Waters
“I think that is a big problem that entrepreneurs face is “when do I stop?” because you don't know, and you do have this never ending, growing task list or projects to do and you could in theory work on them until you died. Like you could just go straight through because they're never going to end, but what you do learn is that you're a better leader, you are a better boss, you are a better entrepreneur when you just take five minutes or thirty minutes or an hour or a day.” -Shannon Waters