David Hawthorne

▶0:01HostWelcome to the Built by People podcast, where we share the stories and insights of the world's top HR leaders. Join us as we dive deep into the minds of HR executives, uncovering their strategies, challenges, and triumphs in shaping today's workforce. I'm excited to welcome David Hawthorne to the Built By People podcast. David, thank you so much for joining us. And I always love to start with the starting question of tell us a little bit more about your career journey.

▶0:57GuestSo, yeah, so I, you know, started working at restaurants in college and out of college, wound up working for Taco Bell for a while in operations and left Taco Bell Corporation, got into recruiting, which led into HR. I tell people all the time, I don't think people kind of grow up saying, I want to be in HR one day. They just kind of fall into it. So it certainly happened with me. Spent some HR time in a couple of different industries, wound up back in restaurants with the Taco Bell franchise, Pacific Bells. That I've been with for, you know, 20-plus years now, doing HR for them, really, you know, from employee relations and helping with workers' comp and benefits out in the field to now the chief people officer for the company and running a team of about 26 people, helping 12,500 people out. So it's been a, it's been a great journey, a lot of growth, a lot of development, which is something that is very important to me. To provide for my team as well, just to, you know, show that, you know, hey, you can be a manager at Taco Bell one day and wind up being an executive somewhere. It's, you know, not as hard as people think.

▶2:03HostDavid, how does HR support strategic leadership and skill acquisition in an industry as fast-paced and dynamic as restaurants and hospitality?

▶2:13GuestWe spend a ton of time talking to people about, you know, constantly learning and developing and training. You know, the restaurant industry, especially established restaurants, companies like Taco Bell or Buffalo Wild Wings, of whom we're franchisees of both. You know, they have great programs for management development for their operations managers, etc. So we're able to leverage that as we talk to our people about things. But we also talk to our people about, you know, outside opportunities. You know, what books can you read? What webinars can you attend? What people can you talk to and be mentored by to help you continue to grow? You know, the wonderful thing about the restaurant industry, as fast-paced as it is and as high as turnover is, there's a core group of people in any restaurant company that have been there for, for years and years and years. And we have amazing tenure with our company despite having, you know, industry average turnover of well over 100%. You know, there are just lots of people that have grown and we're able to share those stories. The owner of our company, Tom Cook started out frying taco shells at a Taco Bell. Now he owns 282 of them, you know, so it's something our brand president started out in as a restaurant manager. We've got directors of operations who started out as team members. So we're always able to share those stories because there's a ton of them where people get to grow up and do that. So we're constantly talking about those things. Yes, we have metrics to hit. We have customers to serve, all the important things that running a restaurant entail. But from our perspective, especially on the HR team, we're really out there about, you know, hey, what did you learn from this and how can you leverage that going forward and leverage it into a career for yourself? How do you make yourself better?

▶3:56HostDavid, what role does bench and succession planning play in managing 12,500 employees and franchise operations, and how do you approach that effectively?

▶4:06GuestIt is an immense process. We actually have a bench planning process that we've used for, for 15+ years now. Every 4 weeks, our managers sit down and talk to their managers about their team. So whether you're a restaurant manager talking to your district manager about your team, whether you're a district manager talking to your director of operations about the restaurant managers, it goes all the way up to the executive level. Every 4 weeks, we're talking about where people are. We have a coding system, you know, is somebody ready to promote now, ready to promote in 6 months, ready to promote in a year? If so, what are they working on to get there? If not, what do we need to do to get them ready for promotion? So those conversations are just part of our DNA at this point. And we do it so often, so frequently, and we do it at the office. Our accounting team has bench planning calls, our finance team, the HR team has bench planning calls, and we all do it. And so it's just become an entrenched part of how we do business is really always talking about our people and what's next for them.

▶5:09HostDave, you talked about stories of people who've started out entry-level. They've worked their way into being a director of operations. I wanted to build on that with this next question. And the next question is, how can HR promote the restaurant industry as a long-term career path for skill and leadership development?

▶5:28GuestI take every opportunity I get, whether it's a podcast like this one or just talking to people in other industries or other fields as I network. You know, it's the classic joke of, you know, hey, you can go to college and get a degree, or you can say, do you want fries with that for the rest of your life? And people make fun of that. And it's really— it's a shame. I mean, there are restaurant managers out there running fast food restaurants that make $100,000 a year in total compensation. So, I mean, it is a lucrative business to be in. It's hard work. There's a lot to do. But I do my best to dispel that myth that, you know, fast food is a dead end. You know, every brand leader that we have, we run about, you know, 9 different brands under our umbrella. And every brand leader we have started out at entry level somewhere and have worked their way up to that. I think, you know, the restaurant industry is a great place for, you know, people who've never worked before to get great skills and learn great things. People who get part-time jobs, you know, working for us and really love the restaurant industry and get in and see what the opportunities are. And again, our bench planning process kind of promotes that. We're always talking about, hey, have you ever thought about being a shift leader for us? Have you ever thought about being an assistant manager for us? And these people begin to work their way up and get more vested and more devoted, and we become more devoted to them and kind of help them out along the way. So I think, you know, really the big part of that is just really dispelling that myth that, you know, fast food restaurants are kind of a dead end. They are not a dead end. And there are a lot of people working for a company that can attest to that.

▶7:05HostDavid, what challenges and opportunities arise in aligning HR strategies with franchise operations, and how do you navigate them?

▶7:14GuestYou know, franchise operations are tough. You know, when you look at any franchise organization, they're paying royalties to a franchisor. So, you know, when you look at profit margins for most of them, they're losing 4 to 5% right off the top for royalties that are going out to that. So most franchisees, you'll find, run pretty lean financially. And so it's not something that we can throw a lot of money at. So, you know, when we need to develop something, it's not like, hey, let's put $100,000 in the budget for this. Finding $100,000 in the margins in the restaurant industry is tough to do. So we have to be very creative in how we approach things and how can we leverage knowledge that we have, how can we leverage what software systems, what can we do to make sure that we can keep costs low while driving a really quality, whether it's the development training, mentoring program, you know, how can we do that for a low cost but yet still provide a quality product and great results?

▶8:10HostDavid, how does HR balance operational needs with creating growth opportunities for employees at all levels in the restaurant industry?

▶8:19GuestYou know, for us, it really is relatively simple. I mean, when you look at the way restaurants work, restaurants are always looking to give people more responsibility. So for us, it's just part of our culture. You know, if you come in as a high school kid working a couple of nights a week while you're going to classes, hey, you turn 18, I might want to give you keys to the building so you can supervise shifts a couple of nights a week while you're here. And we're happy to do that. And so it just kind of goes hand in glove to kind of how we operate, how we see our culture, and how we want to promote people and have them, you know, get more responsibility and get to, to positions of leadership.

▶8:58HostDavid, any parting advice you'd like to share with our audience?

▶9:02GuestYou know, one of the things that we see in young leaders a lot, you know, talking about generational things, etc., I'm not one who really believes that, you know, all the generations are different. We said a lot of things about young people when we were young. People said a lot of things about us that they say about young people today. So, you know, I think those are things I don't pay a lot of attention to. I do like to impress upon people, though, to really take your career into your own hands. Don't wait for somebody to hand something to you and don't worry about what other people are doing. I see a lot of people who spend a lot of emotional and mental capacity worrying about what's happening to somebody else instead of focusing and saying, hey, what do I need to be doing to drive the result that I want to get to where I want to be? So I try to tell people all the time, you know, Don't stop, stop comparing. Is the grass greener? Stop comparing. Is that person got more or less than me? It's all about what do you want? How are you going to get there? Set your own goals and drive for those.

▶10:01HostDavid, thank you so much for joining us on the Built by People podcast. It was a pleasure having you on.

▶10:05GuestThank you very much. Appreciate it.