Rookie manager has the first ever CRAZY day, and did NOT freak out........

Have you ever had one of those days when you woak up and just thought " Hmmm, I'm up earlier than my alarm, I'm kicking some ass today, and then one thing leads to another......

Well today was one of those days for me! I was out of my house at 6:15, and excited because I left my house before my ONTIME, and excited to check in my first ever truck order. So I am driving to work and when I am about almost half the way to work I realized, "S***, I forgot my ^&^&*$$ keys". ( I'm sure everyone in Central Ohio heard it, Andy I apologize for waking you up by a f-bomb or 10 even if you live in Delaware!) LOL. So I speed home, get home, sprint into my house get the keys and out the door I go again!

I get to my restaurant, my awesome cook Casar is waiting for me, and I apologize profusely! I got there at 6:40, so no biggie to him 'cause he's only been there for 10 minutes. I noticed that the lights were off, as well as the alarm when I had to turn it off. I think to myself, " No Biggie, they probably did a night drop, and Cesar and I will bang out checking everything in with him in the cooler".. We walk in, turn everything on, open the coolers....... NO NIGHT DROP! WTF? First ever open with a truck, no food.....uh oh!

10 minutes roll by as I get situated for the morning. The phone rings, it's the food service company telling me " The truck broke down, and I don't have an ETA for you on when it will arrive, we are sorry". At that point, I went into Code Red, banged out some prep lists, realized what our needs were, and got some product from another restaurant.

Then in the next two hours ( the short version) beer reps come and go, a mechanical service for the ice machine, produce, and then the staff! Our KEY employee walks rocking out her awesome new server t-shirt and a apron. I was kinda confused at that point( I thought she was my MID mgr) , and apparently, she was taken off the schedule and it was my first Front/Back! Thank YOU GOD, I was rocking out nice BOH black pants and a polo this morning, cause I had no idea. I called my GM assured him I had it under control, and we ran with it. It's great to have your leader have the confidence that YOU can really do it!

11am rolled around and a cook cut himself to the point I had to send him to the ER! Until I could get a cook in at 11:45, I cooked the MID station in 10 minute intervals, went out front connected with guests and checked on my FOH associates, and just had fun! It was a fun rotation, now that I look back on it!


Now, that the day is said and gone, it really wasn't bad. I had to be a HUGE LEADER today. When I walked out of work today, it felt good that everything was done, and done right. I may have had 10 things to do at once, but I got all 10 things done, plus more! When I needed help, I asked for it because that's what a real leader should do. I can't begin to tell any of you how proud I was of ALL of my associates, fellow managers, and our 2 MITS " doing what it takes" to do the right thing. Even my servers hanging Happy Hour Clings outside, or Kevin and Jeremy checking in and putting away the truck for me when it was 5:15pm (when it arrived), or my General Manager putting his morning aside for 30 minutes getting product for me. I can't wait to recognize all for being there. It's an amazing feeling.