Operational Lead (Culinary)

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Bias to action. You act now to help fix a company's menu, kitchen, and margins.

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Culinary craft with a business lens. You can support menu innovation and engineering, but you think about them in terms of food cost, labor, and contribution margin — not just flavor and creativity.

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Strong interpersonal skills. In co-management situations, you work collaboratively with the president as their partner. In interim management situations, you calm the nerves of the kitchen and front-of-house teams, and instill confidence in the employee-owners.

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Love of implementation and operations. This is not an ivory tower strategy or R&D chef role. It's to quickly develop menu and operational changes, and implement them in a working kitchen. You are both the chef and the CEO — comfortable on the line and in the P&L.

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Running towards the fire. You can handle tough conversations about underperforming products, waste, or margin. A restaurant losing money is an intellectual puzzle, not something you run from.

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Meaningful culinary experience in a scratch kitchen (e.g., chef, kitchen manager, culinary director, or similar) combined with operational or small business leadership experience

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Track record of menu development, engineering, and costing — you understand recipe costing, food cost percentage, and how menu design drives margin

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Business acumen and analytical skills to oversee company financials — P&L, COGS, labor cost — and translate that into culinary and operational decisions, akin to a President's lens on the business

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Demonstrated people leadership skills, ideally managing kitchen or restaurant teams

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Strong interpersonal and communication skills; low-ego

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Entrepreneurial mindset and a desire to build

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Project-management and problem-solving skills with a roll-up-the-sleeves, get-it-done attitude

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Growth-mindset and a willingness to explore new ideas and innovations; not afraid to learn from your mistakes

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An ability to think creatively, be adaptable and curious

Why should you join us?

Teamshares believes in supporting every team member with a competitive salary and a generous benefits package, including: equity for all employees, exceptional medical/dental/vision benefits plans for employees and their families, and paid parental leave.

We recognize and facilitate the tangible impacts each employee has on our mission, while still maintaining a healthy work-life balance culture that emphasizes unplugging at the end of the work day. Our team values time off and actually takes vacation. We embody a growth mindset and provide the support you need to grow in your career.