Excellence has to be taught
Calling a team Aces Only sets a high bar. The useful question is what happens when a new employee walks in without knowing how to make the pizza. Jazmine Charles has a clear answer: teach them, work beside them and give them the tools to meet the expectation.
In her ChatGTM conversation with Michael Beck and Chad Horn, Charles describes people operations at Disrupt Foods as part of how the restaurants function. The organization expects effort and a willingness to do good work. It also accepts responsibility for developing the ability that the work requires.
That balance gives the phrase substance. A standard becomes more credible when a team can see the instruction, practice and support behind it. Without those things, a demanding slogan can leave employees guessing at what success looks like while managers wonder why the result varies.
Take the policy into the restaurant
Charles describes learning across brands and from people with different operating backgrounds. The company had to acknowledge that its original way of doing things was not the only useful way. New perspectives could reveal a practice worth adopting or an assumption worth revisiting.
She makes the same point about the distance between the office and the restaurant. Writing a procedure without understanding the work can create instructions that look sensible on a screen and fail during a shift. Her leadership approach includes being in the field and involving operating managers in decisions.
For an operator reviewing a process, that suggests a straightforward test. Watch someone use it under ordinary conditions. Ask where they hesitate, what they need to know and what they do when the expected sequence breaks. The goal is a procedure that helps a person perform the task, rather than a document that merely confirms someone wrote a procedure.
Make the data useful before asking for action
Charles describes a familiar information problem: leaders either lacked access to the data or faced reports too long and technical to use easily. Her team worked on dashboards and AI-assisted reporting that could turn that information into a more understandable recommendation.
Her examples are practical. A report might suggest where a leader should spend part of the morning, or identify an inventory need before a scheduled store visit. The recommendation includes a reason, so the person can understand what changed and why a different plan may be useful.
This is a helpful way to evaluate reporting tools. Ask whether the recipient can identify a decision, understand the supporting evidence and check an exception. A dashboard can contain correct numbers and still leave a busy manager with the entire interpretation job. The useful version reduces that burden while preserving the manager's ability to question the recommendation.
Account for the change you are asking people to absorb
Charles is enthusiastic about technology, but she describes having to temper that enthusiasm when introducing a new human capital management system. A fast rollout might satisfy the project owner while adding another major adjustment for people already managing other changes.
She extends that reasoning to guests. A labor decision can look attractive in a report and still affect the experience in the restaurant. Her people-first approach includes considering both team members and the people they serve when evaluating a change.
A practical planning question follows: what else is changing for this person this week? A new tool, menu item and process may each seem manageable in isolation. Together, they can consume the attention needed to execute any of them well. Sequence the training and the rollout with that combined workload in mind.
Recognize the behavior you want repeated
Charles describes beginning meetings with recognition and making room for anyone to recognize someone else. When the person being praised is absent, the team makes an effort to deliver the message afterward. Recognition is part of the operating rhythm, rather than something reserved for a distant annual event.
That practice makes a standard visible. A specific account of someone helping a colleague or caring for a guest tells the rest of the team what the organization notices. It also gives leaders another reason to pay attention to the daily work beyond the exception that needs correcting.
The same investment in people's capability appears in Charles's account of the Disrupt Business Academy and its work with young people through Boys & Girls Clubs. Learning becomes more tangible when participants can apply it to a real project. Across employees and the wider community, the thread is consistent: give people an opportunity, show them how the work happens and support them as they learn to do more.
