Beer, BBQ, and Business

My favorite business book is “Franklin Barbecue: A Meat-Smoking Manifesto,” by Franklin and Mackay. The book wasn’t written as a business lesson, yet I use this manifesto daily. Applying Franklin’s manifesto demands a deep understanding of my core value, refinement of the product’s value, and ensures time for reflection. The most important lesson is that there is no correct answer. Tools will get you close; knowing when something is done takes skill.

I came from a family of great chefs. Not the type classically trained, but the type where families cooked together and shared time honored recipes. Holidays for us smell of baking bread, sauteed Brussel sprouts, a roasting bird, and warm Kahlua cake.

Turn to college, I had BBQ cookouts almost every weekend and would feed armies of people. My house would perfume my college campus, and friends always knew where to find me. It became a lifestyle, social event, and habit.

Even today, I am always looking for an excuse to invite anyone over to my house. I mainly don’t like eating leftovers, and what fun it is to cook 2 pounds of meat when I can fit about 15 on my smoker?

When I was getting my MBA, a classmate and I bonded over good BBQ. He introduced me to Aaron Franklin’s style. When I tried Franklin’s brisket for the first time, I realized I had a lot of learning to do. So I bought his book and began my journey.

Be Flexible

No two briskets are the same. You want to believe they would taste the same, but they won’t.

When applying to business, no two decisions are the same, and we use our learnings only to increase our probability of success. Similarly, situations you run into may look the same, and we may want to comfort ourselves by saying we have seen this before.

In reality, the situation may look familiar; treating it as before could be a mistake. Adapt to your situation and use your past to shape your future decisions, not replicate them.

Recently, I was work working through a complex problem with my team. Our product portfolio had a severe gap and could not cover the new use cases for 5G. We needed to expand our product to incorporate a campus view. Team members that have been around for awhile stated, “That won’t work. We have tried it before.”

We now have a campus product, and it is through a complex relationship with a partner. Everyone said it wouldn’t work, so why did it this time? Think about the brisket, they look the same, but they are not. Our competitive environment was changing, but also for those around us. Seizing an opportunity, we created a win-win scenario, and today we are happily competing from an attack position on 5G.

Cut the fat keep the value

Building value means cutting the fat and focusing on the value of the product. And much like Aaron would suggest, when trimming a brisket, trim with purpose. The trimming allows the smoke to frictionlessly engulf your product leaving it more desirable than when it started. If you trim to remove just the fat, your dinner will be dry and tasteless.

While McDonald’s makes a decent burger, they understand their locations’ value is far greater than the meat between the bun. If they didn’t understand their value prop, they may have misplaced resources and invest in creating the best burger rather than expanding the brand. Instead, they cut the fat, and now you can visit a McDonald’s in 100 countries with more than 38,000 restaurants. Sure the burger is just okay, but isn’t that the point?

Looking at my product, I could help companies understand theoretical network performance. Or help network operators deploy networks faster while reducing equipment costs by understanding network performance. Either way, if I don’t understand which statement to choose, I can end up with the wrong product.

If you can’t discern between your core value (aka brisket) or the fat, you may need more customer voice and strategic insight before distilling your value prop into smaller, refined pieces.

Enjoy with beer

You’ve done it! Somehow you faced all the odds and developed products that delight your customers. Far too often, we quickly move from one project to another without celebrating the journey. Take a moment to cheers a colleague and customer. Reflect on what went well and what could be improved. Most importantly, enjoy the results of your labor.

Watching Aaron Franklin create BBQ is a work of art. He effortlessly navigates many unknowns to generate consistent results. At what temperature is a brisket done? He would tell you there is no answer. Use frameworks and tools to get close, but sharpen your intuition and evolvement to know when it’s ready.

The picture is me standing outside of Franklin's BBQ with the coveted "Last man standing" sign. In otherwords, I was the bearer of bad news that folks arriving after me had no gaurentee of getting brisket.