Zucchini Flower Connection Part 2: Connecting your departments the Fiori di Zucca Fritti Way.

Zucchini Flower Connection

Are you ready to learn our mom's recipe for creating the most delicious Fiori di Zucca Fritti? And the handsome men making them?

 

 

And what do these delicious Italian delicacies have to do with a growing company's dilemma: Is your business wholly connected?

 

 

 

During the zucchini season, early in the morning, my mom would go to her garden and pick the most tender, bright male zucchini blossoms.

She would rinse them gently, not to break them. She would let them dry and store them for the evening. When it was time, my mom with only a few ingredients would fry some of the most delicious zucchini flowers. She would always make a batch for me to share with my friends. My friend Tom would be one of the recipients of these delightful blossoms. It would bring back his memories of his mom, making the flowers the same way.

In honor of our moms and how they put love and Italian TLC into making these blossoms, we will show you the recipe and also how we connected every single department in our company.

Fiori di Zucca Fritti

Layout the flowers, rinse the soil and bugs off, drain, and lay them out to dry.  

  

Create a flow—the same flow as in business with my Client Profile Flow System.  The company would set up a flow: contract packet to profiles to YTD Boards.  As Tom and I would set up a flow, flower to flour to egg to the pan to mouth.

 

We place two large bowls to the left of the stove. Fill one bowl with white or almond flour and the other with whisked eggs. On the stove, place the iron pan filled with virgin olive oil. Start the heating of the oil. It must be hot. Dip the flower in the almond or white flour. Dredge the blossom now in the egg, both sides. And put in the pan to fry lightly.

 

Wonder if your mouth is watering with the idea of tasting the Fiori Di Zucca Friti.

Each station in the flow has its system, and each group of stations is like a department: Domenic in Sales, Tom in the Production, and Doug in Accounting.

One depending on the other to not only do its work but to make sure the job is what the next station/department needs. 

As in any system, we also need human resources to run the systems.  We find the devastatingly handsome Doug.  Well, he is team upon himself, and besides, the owner of Marathon Deli in Ashland, MA. You couldn't find a better team member. 

 

 

I want to get back to connections and one of my company's career development classes. It was the best of times, and it was the worst of times.

 I was coaching and mentoring at one of our systems development sessions with the sales and production departments. We were revisiting one of our new systems: Contract to Production to Invoice Flow.

 

I was having some system flow issues with the sales department and with the production department. It was a cluster.  But, that is the nature of system development.  We had great people. Everything is possible!

The discussion was how the sales department put the content of the information packet together—and how the information flowed to the production and accounting departments.

 Production knew what they needed.  The Accounting department knew what they required.

Before I could fix the issue, I had to do some research to start the process and follow it to the end.  Then have a class on it with all the employees that touched the process. 

I found that the system of the flow that was not working was in the Sales Department. 

There was a particular young lady administrator; I'll call her Mary B.

But no matter how I put this nor how I mentored this young lady. She did not grasp the system in her sales department nor how it affected the others down the line.

 

Solving these types of issues is where good leadership is needed, and good mentoring is the answer. You always start looking for the issues with the system and see if education is the first culprit. The last area I would look into was the employee.  I never think to begin as if it was a lousy employee.  I look at if the system is the problem, then the flow, then education, and the last resort the person.

We just implemented this connective system two months before, and we were revisiting and reviewing the system and flows for any flaws in the system. And second, we were genuinely looking to see if it satisfied each employee that touched the system in and between departments. 

We discussed with all the departments how the "new and approved" Sales to Work Order to Invoicing System was working and the issues each department was having.

As I reviewed the systems and the templates: blah, blah, blah flows to Production and blah, blah, blah flows to accounting, a hand raised from one of the production foremen, I'll call him, Everardo.

Everardo raised his hand, stood up, held up a work order, and stated, "How was I supposed to complete this work order and build this wall at so and so client?" I have "very little" information on what materials to use, how the client wants the wall, even when to do the project.  I have the contract, but it still is not clear.

Well, let's say he said, "Very little" with just a few more colorful words. He had a lot on his schedule plate. And we landscapers have a way we speak, sorry for the young at heart!

I was smiling ear to ear because I knew at this very moment, "Here is the exact reason that it so important to have clear, concise information from Sales." OMG, I could not have made up a story or gave a better sermon from the mount to make each of the departments see how vital this information flow is to ALL of us. 

After listening to Everardo's issue, Mary B jumped up out of her sit.  She said the problem lies with me.  I didn't do all of what I must do before passing it on to the next stage. I am sorry and I see now how to fix this issue.

She was beside herself and a bit flustered. But, like the great team member that she was, a light bulb went off in her head. Before this session, she did not recognize how she presented the sales contract information or lack of information to Production.  Nor did she realize how it affected the organization. 

Even the work order, which should describe all of the information in detail from the contract, should have been part of the packet given to Production.  AHHHHHH!!!!!

But this foreman, in real-time, gave all of us what the problem he was having, how much time it took him to look for the information, and how he could not do his job for the company nor the client.  He was doing someone else's work, and he was getting frustrated.

This is what connection means.  It means that the employee is connected to the system by doing her work.  It also means that her work and her department are connected to another department. Her work that comes out of Sales is vital to sales AND to Production AND to Accounting, or connection, connection, and connection. 

 

Now back to our regular schedule program: Fiori di Zucca Fritti

Ok, let’s see if we have the problem of all that we need to make breakfast:

• Mental facilities, check (well as check as we can get after the Rolling Stones concert)
• Utensils (bowls, whisk, prongs, iron frying pans), check,
• Ingredients (regular flour, almond flour (for the Keto in us), olive oil, eggs, salt, grated parmesan), check, 
• Cappuccinos, hmm brewing… check

 

Does it look like we are ready or what?

Let’s face it Tom, Doug, and I were born ready. 

Using my system and engineering mind and with Doug and Tom’s creativity in the kitchen, we make the flows and the preparation.

Stay tuned for the last part of Fiori di Zucca Fritti, our Zucchini Flower Connections,

And to find out how the heroes overcame the obstacles with exactly how every department is connected and our company's worldview changed? 

Please leave a comment and join the conversation.  

If you would like to email me a question, click AskDomenic