Axios C-Suite: Lessons from Danny Meyer

Danny Meyer, the legendary restaurateur behind Union Square Cafe and Shake Shack, is out with the rare biz book that's very much worthy of your time: "What Could Possibly Go Right?"

I asked him for a few non-obvious lessons he's learned that would be helpful to all CEOs and leaders:

1. Hire for HQ. EQ is emotional intelligence, the ability to read the room. HQ, or hospitality intelligence, is a step above: the ability to both read it and instinctively take action to make it better. Meyer screens for six traits: optimistic kindness, curious intelligence, work ethic, empathy, self-awareness and integrity. Integrity is the veto: "If you don't have integrity ... I don't really care about all the other stuff." When a hire flops, his team audits which trait they missed.
2. "Essentiality." Danny and I bonded over our obsession with cutting away anything that isn't vital. You need people and product that are truly essential. Otherwise, you'll get lost in the sea of endless choices. Growth pressure tempts you to add units and menu items. Scale the essential, not the footprint.
3. Don't f'ing settle. Meyer calls it D.F.S. Great companies rarely go bad overnight. They slip slowly: a lowered standard here, a tolerated miss there. Pretty soon, average feels normal. And normal is not essential. Restless improvement is vital.
4. Change your grip. What got you here won't get you there. As leaders, we need to push ourselves every day to offload things others can do better — and then evolve our swing. Hoarding the dopamine hit of being good at something is selfish and self-limiting.

Buy his book! This WSJ excerpt gives you a taste of it.

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