Gordon Ramsay, Corporate Pundit

I've been watching the first season of the US 'Kitchen Nightmares' show and Gordon Ramsay is my new hero.

After about the fifth episode, it seems to get a little repetitive, but what good lessons can be learned from watching this show.

Here are the lessons I have learned from Gordon Ramsay:

1. If your work is not your passion, get out. Go be a temp or something until you figure it out. If you know what it is and you still haven't tried to find work in that field, you are doing yourself, the company you work for, and everyone around you a terrible disservice. You are cheating yourself and probably making a lot of people around you miserable. If you had that passion but have since lost it, figure out why - fast. Kick yourself in the butt. Invite others to kick you in the butt.

I love how Ramsay gets up in people's faces about this, because he is 100% right. I wasted nearly twenty years of my life in telecom. I don't just not-care about the telecom industry, I actively hate it. I should never, ever have gone into that line of business. I got a lot of lectures about my attitude when I worked for Mighty Citadel, and even though most of the people who lectured me were complete asses, on this point they were right.

Now even being on the fringes of publishing makes me happy. Very, very, very happy. I know that I personally have made an impact on what people read. It's a teeny, tiny impact, but it's there. And if Really Cool Idea comes to fruition, it will affect not just some senior editor at Random House, but probably anyone who reads this blog.

So Ramsay's right. If it isn't your passion, get out of the kitchen.

2. Wake up and smell the French roast. There are some people in this show who are completely delusional and will refuse to see reason, even at the cost of their marriage, their home, and their livelihood. On the 'Sebastian's' episode, Sebastian kept saying over and over again what a "unique concept" his menu was. This guy has obviously never been to a Jersey diner. My jaw dropped several times as I watched this.

Here was possibly the most successful chef in the entire world, advising this piker what to do and the guy refused to believe him. Ramsay said, "The menu's a nightmare and you aren't even using your wood-fired ovens, this place is perfect for being one of the best pizza places around."

And what did Sebastian do? Started prattling about how he wants to franchise his "unique concept" menu and refused to listen to Ramsay. Called him a loser.

By this point, I was pinching myself. I couldn't believe this could be real.

3. It only takes one pivotal person with the wrong attitude and / or vision to bring a business to the brink of destruction. In the season 2 episode, "Handlebar", the owner is convinced that his outdated and miserable way of doing things is wrong. You can tell from the very beginning that the owner is so tied to doing things his way that Ramsay's effort is basically wasted.

4. Your job is not the place to work out your neuroses about your parents. In the 'Seascape' episode, the co-owner was constantly belittled and berated by his father. The father's gone and the mother is now trying to get him to man up. I saw more than one slump-shouldered guy in these episodes, but this guy was the worst. Ramsay took him to a gym, into a boxing ring, and forced him to open up to the anger and aggression he felt. As good as it was for the time Ramsay was there, it obviously wasn't a permanent solution and I had a feeling this guy would slide right back down to where he'd been when Ramsay left.

5. Pay attention like a grown-up when experts are earnestly talking to you. I know Gordon Ramsay is not doing this out of the goodness of his heart. There's money, there's ego, there's self-promotion, but you cannot fake the passion and intensity of his feeling about good food and running a good restaurant. If Dean Koontz or Michael Chabon read one of my manuscripts and pulled me aside and said, "Becs, this stinks and here's why", I would be a complete and utter ass not to pay attention to every single word they said. These people are experts with a string of successes. They know their craft. To ignore that wealth of knowledge or to shut down about it when they're talking to me would be one of the stupidest things on earth that I could do.

There is one more lesson that applies to running a restaurant that would not necessarily fare well in the corporate world. That is: Wear your heart on your sleeve. In more than one episode, the restaurant owners are somehow afraid to come out and admit how much they love their restaurant and how desperately they want to succeed. The 'Olde Stone Mill' episode showed the owner, who had basically built the place with his own two hands, afraid to genuinely commit to his restaurant. If you don't love it, how can you expect other people to?

It seems so simple, doesn't it?