A Lesson From Hu-Hots and Gordon Ramsay

After a very good meeting with a small group of Central Iowa Blogger members, I headed over to Hu-Hots to get a good lunch.  For those who don’t know, Hu-Hots is one of those places where you put everything you want into a bowl and they grill it up on a giant grill in the middle of the room.  In some places it is called “Pot Stickers” and some places it is called a “Mongolian Grill.”

A couple friends and I arrived shortly after the place opened for lunch thinking it would be better than at night.  You see, it is a very popular place, and sometimes you can get stuck waiting for your turn in line for several minutes (or longer).  And that is AFTER you get seated.

Seating was not an issue however, and we were quickly seated just as the place was getting very busy.  It seems everybody had the same idea to go there for lunch on the holiday.

Over the past year I have been telling my coworkers about some of the management lessons I have learned from watching the television show Hell’s Kitchen, and also Kitchen Nightmares.  So much so I think they have stop listening.  Little did I know that our little lunch would prove to be a fantastic demonstration of what I have been trying to illustrate to the entire company the past several months.

During the natural progression of the day, the restaurant is allowed to fill up, empty, and repeat the process several times.  Things end up even-ing out so that there is no line at the grill.   But the morning is another story…

In the morning, everybody comes in at the same time.  They sit down, order their drinks, and go to the grill at the same time.  They eat their plate of food more or less at the same time.  Then they go up for seconds – again at the same time.  During this time  more people are coming in.  Soon the line is not only around the grill, but around where the bowls are started!

Why?

Everybody is trying to do the same thing at the same time.

Apply this to web development:  There really is such a thing as too much work at a given time.  While you may think it is your company’s best interest to start on a project as soon as you get the client and not have them wait… in the end you will have a line-up of clients “waiting their turn” to get their project started.  Then they start getting grouchy, complaining about the long lines, etc.   So you finally get to them, do a bunch of things, and then boom… they have to wait in line again.

This is why it is absolutely necessary to balance the load.  Be honest with your clients as to when something will start.  If your team is overloaded, tell the client you won’t be able to start on it for 2-3 weeks.  If you are really overloaded, you may need to either a) tell the client it will be a while before you can start b) hire additional extra help or c) pass on the project.  But not being honest with your client, and then having them wait and wait and wait… will breed hostility and ill feelings fast.

Just be honest.  You’ll both appreciate it.