Ina Garten is an expert on big career changes. She built a multi-million dollar culinary empire after quitting her government job and starting a grocery store.
Garten’s husband, Jeffrey, gave her some wise advice when she decided to leave her previous career, she told Amy Poehler on the Nov. 25 episode of the Good Hang with Amy Poehler podcast.
“I told Jeffrey that he really needed to find something else to do, and he said, ‘Just choose something that you enjoy. Just choose something that you want to do. If you love it, you’ll probably be good at it,'” Garten said.
She purchased her first store, Barefoot Contessa, in 1978 in Westhampton Beach, New York.
Garten said running his own store was difficult at first. She had to “learn how to be a boss very quickly” and struggled to find her own leadership style.
“A friend gave me some advice: Your employees need two things from you. They need you to be clear. And they need you to be happy,” Garten said.
Since then, Garten has practiced more direct commands, such as “put this candy in a bag and wrap it like this,” determined to keep bad days from “disturbing the energy in the room” at the store.
“That was the best business lesson I ever learned,” Garten recalls.
How does she communicate criticism?
Garten has “very clear” rules regarding feedback to employees. “If I’m criticizing you, I’ll take you out of the room and discuss what you can do better. If I’m complimenting you, I’ll do it with everyone around you.”
Although Garten tries to avoid firing employees, “I usually give them a lot of warning and tell them what they need to improve,” she said, but sometimes the work isn’t right.
Learning how to fire employees was also a leadership skill Garten had to develop.
After a month of running Barefoot Contessa, Garten noticed that one of her younger employees was “absolutely terrible” at her job.
“She was very nice, but she wasn’t very good,” Garten said, and decided to fire her.
“I took her out from behind and explained that there must be other jobs that you’re good at, and this isn’t one of them,” Garten told Poehler.
Garten said she was “very soft-spoken because I was worried about hurting her feelings,” but that she had trouble getting her point across to the employee.
“The next day she showed up again for work. She didn’t know she had been fired,” Garten laughed.
Garten didn’t have the energy to try to fire the employee again, so he allowed her to work for the rest of the summer.
Now, Garten has mastered the art of firing people gently but firmly. She said she fires people “in a way that makes them say thank you and give them a kiss on the way out.”
As a leader, Garten also values transparency. Garten said that once an employee is fired, he gathers the rest of the team and explains what happened.
She always worries that other employees will be angry with her for firing a coworker, she told Poehler. “But 100 percent of the time, they’re like, ‘Oh,[they]were such a pain. We hated working with them. We’re so glad you fired them.'”
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