Starting Pronto, I knew if I had to properly think through how every bit of the operation would work, I would have doubted my ability and never started it. I worked out the general plan of the business but had to just jump in and learn the rest as I went.
I employed 2 delivery guys (thankfully, one spoke English) and 3 other staff for cooking, packaging the food, shopping, and cleaning. Since the English-speaking delivery guy was always on the road I had to find a way to communicate with the other 3 staff who spoke only Portuguese. Thank goodness for internet connection and google translate! When I needed to give instructions from cooking to hygiene rules I used google translate and got the staff to read. Then I found out the young girl I was training as a cook couldn’t read!! Hmmm…Things got a bit complicated with having to get both of them to stop what they were doing and one to read the text and explain to the other! That was hard and we were losing valuable time. So, I had to think in advance about everything I needed them to know. I wrote detailed instructions of how to make all the food, hygiene regulations, list of daily routine and tasks for each staff member. I translated them using google and posted them on the kitchen wall to minimise confusion and make sure we didn’t run around looking for translators at peak trading hours.
Before starting the business, I had these romantic and cute ideas about running my own business. I was gonna turn the small bedroom upstairs overlooking the sea into my office and calmly workout all my marketing strategies and future expansion from there while the staff I have trained worked downstairs to produce delicious meal that is well presented and packaged. It would take me about a month to train them and it will all be like a clock-work. Yeah right! There was no time for strategy or expansion planning, it was like a headless chicken daily routine of running from 7am to 6pm with no lunch breaks till 2pm. Shouting instructions and calling the delivery guy 50 times to make sure he delivered the food to clients on time and found the address.
Me, Ms no-sense-of-direction, was now in charge of training the delivery guy about Maputo delivery routes, short-cuts, rush-hour bottle-necks, etc. I would never have thought in a million years I would be a delivery-man, imagine that? I learnt when you need to figure out something, you just do. No such thing as I can’t do this or that, everything depends on you and you just have to make it happen.
Running a start-up in a sector you don’t know much beyond love for cooking, in a country where you don’t speak the language and choosing a delivery business with no sense of direction is a good place to start facing your fears.
I employed 2 delivery guys (thankfully, one spoke English) and 3 other staff for cooking, packaging the food, shopping, and cleaning. Since the English-speaking delivery guy was always on the road I had to find a way to communicate with the other 3 staff who spoke only Portuguese. Thank goodness for internet connection and google translate! When I needed to give instructions from cooking to hygiene rules I used google translate and got the staff to read. Then I found out the young girl I was training as a cook couldn’t read!! Hmmm…Things got a bit complicated with having to get both of them to stop what they were doing and one to read the text and explain to the other! That was hard and we were losing valuable time. So, I had to think in advance about everything I needed them to know. I wrote detailed instructions of how to make all the food, hygiene regulations, list of daily routine and tasks for each staff member. I translated them using google and posted them on the kitchen wall to minimise confusion and make sure we didn’t run around looking for translators at peak trading hours.
Before starting the business, I had these romantic and cute ideas about running my own business. I was gonna turn the small bedroom upstairs overlooking the sea into my office and calmly workout all my marketing strategies and future expansion from there while the staff I have trained worked downstairs to produce delicious meal that is well presented and packaged. It would take me about a month to train them and it will all be like a clock-work. Yeah right! There was no time for strategy or expansion planning, it was like a headless chicken daily routine of running from 7am to 6pm with no lunch breaks till 2pm. Shouting instructions and calling the delivery guy 50 times to make sure he delivered the food to clients on time and found the address.
Me, Ms no-sense-of-direction, was now in charge of training the delivery guy about Maputo delivery routes, short-cuts, rush-hour bottle-necks, etc. I would never have thought in a million years I would be a delivery-man, imagine that? I learnt when you need to figure out something, you just do. No such thing as I can’t do this or that, everything depends on you and you just have to make it happen.
Running a start-up in a sector you don’t know much beyond love for cooking, in a country where you don’t speak the language and choosing a delivery business with no sense of direction is a good place to start facing your fears.
Sounds like a great lesson in self-reliance. You're amazing.
ReplyDeleteAndrew
Thanks Andrew, always with kindest words.
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