Is Your Venue’s Culture Fueling Fires or Creating Flow?

I’ve walked into a lot of staff rooms over the past 30 years. And more than once, I’ve seen this pattern:

• There’s a shiny new initiative on the wall
• A fresh incentive or team lunch planned for Friday
• A recent training session still being “talked about” in theory…

But underneath it all there’s tension, there’s burnout, and there’s that low hum of “this isn’t working”.

And when I ask what’s really going on, it’s almost always the same:

– Middle managers managing staff, rosters, guest complaints and operational messes all at once
– Different leadership styles depending on the shift, the manager or the department
– Great training launched with excitement and forgotten without reinforcement
– Staff who say all the right things but still disengage when no one’s watching

When culture feels reactive, inconsistent, or chaotic, we often look to surface fixes, a new staff incentive, a pizza day, a policy tweak. And while those things can help… they won’t change your culture. Not if your leaders are still putting out fires every day instead of leading with clarity and calm.

Culture doesn’t change because we say it should.

It changes when the people leading the team – not just the CEO or GM, but the supervisors, team leads and duty managers – shift how they show up each day.

It changes when staff feel like the standard on Tuesday morning is the same as it was during training.
It changes when their duty manager can have a hard conversation without panic.
It changes when team members stop waiting for someone to “notice” and start taking ownership because they feel safe to do so.

Because culture isn’t taught. It’s in the micro-moments between shifts, the way someone’s pulled aside, the tone used in team meetings, the calm during a crisis.

Culture is leadership in motion.

So how do you move from chaos to culture?

You start with the middle. You stop expecting them to absorb pressure without tools. You equip them with the right frameworks for clarity, feedback, conflict and boundaries. You train them not just to manage tasks, but to lead people.

Because when middle managers feel supported, skilled and steady, everything changes. Guests notice. Staff stay. Service standards hold, even under pressure.

That’s what Middle Management Movement is designed for.

We don’t deliver pizza. (We do, however, bring Tim Tams!) We deliver clarity, confidence and consistency – right where your culture lives: on the floor.

Putting out fires is exhausting, so let’s build something that flows instead.

BOOK A CALL to explore the MMM program that fits your venue, your people and your goals for the year ahead.