Hi there,
Frameworks or "mental models" are essentially just ways of thinking through problems and situations.
Why apply frameworks to your coffee shop owner mindset?
Well, well. Many reasons, but I'll explain a few here and drop some of my faves, too.
Frameworks reduce cognitive load
First off, problem-solving is super taxing on the ol' noggin, so creating efficient ways to make decisions preserves your thinking stamina for other tasks.
e.g. Remember how Steve Jobs wore and ate the exact same clothes and food every day?
He did it to reduce the cognitive load those decisions take so he could use his massive brain power on more important things.
Sure, you might not be creating world-changing technology, but that doesn't mean you won't encounter difficult problems, and if you have more energy to devote, the better decision you can make.
Is this really true?
Well, let me ask you: imagine it's 4:30am, you are tired (hey, maybe you're exhausted right now), you haven't slept in 20 hours, you haven't eaten in 10 hours, you haven't had coffee in even longer.
Now, decide which vendor to supply your paper goods.
Oof. Yeah, you're gonna be in for a bad time.
Alright, so some frameworks I love here:
Eat that frog (based on a book of the same title) – do the hardest thing first
Power boxing – toss your to-do list away and ask yourself "what's the ONE THING I can do today to have most impact in my business?"
Power of habit (also based on an eponymous book) – harness good habits so that you don't have to think about what to do, it just comes naturally.
Importance vs Urgency matrix – plot your tasks on a 2x2 grid, with Importance on the x-axis, and Urgency on y-axis, then focus on the tasks in the top right box.
Frameworks for consistency
It confounds me to no end when I visit a new cafe, have a lovely cappuccino, then go back the next day only to get a totally different "cappuccino" because it was prepared by a different barista, operating by their own rules.
I've said it often here in this newsletter: "businesses live and die by their processes"
Turn anything and everything you can into an SOP (standard operating procedure), so that you, or a manager, doesn't have to solve the problem, your staff are empowered to do so on their own.
Eliminate as many gray areas as possible, when making coffee, when dealing with customers, when scheduling and ordering, etc. – hey, even if this means you have to sacrifice your "ideal" outcome.
Studies have shown that customers prefer a consistent, moderate experience to an inconsistent, but occasionally amazing experience.
Okay, but on to applying frameworks for consistency.
In business, you'll have to make difficult decisions. One that comes to mind for me was hiring.
I needed a way to compare candidates after the interview that was more than simply "how much I liked them" – so I created a rating system.
My assistant manager would join me in the interview, then we'd each rate the candidate in several areas, and give them an overall score from 1-10 – the key is that we didn't allow any 7's.
I call this my No 7's framework.
A 7 is no man's land. It's unremarkable. It's beige.
It's not awful, but not amazing. It's a gray area.
So, I take 7 out of the equation and now it's black and white: either the score is good enough to be an 8 or it doesn't cut it.
Frameworks for distribution
Be remarkable – I like creativity for creativity's sake. Just because "it's always been done that way" doesn't mean it has to continue to be so. Make it funky, make it unique, make it remarkable.
First-time founders are obsessed with product, second-time founders are obsessed with distribution – Microsoft Teams launched and became a significant competitor to Slack in less than a year, while it took Slack MANY years to get to where it was. Why? Because MS Teams had the distribution already. So many companies already used Microsoft and had that relationship. So, think about how you can start building your audience from day 0.
Don't sell saddles – Think about a saddle, pretty boring. Some leather, some stirrups. But, now think about being a cowboy. Rugged. Lawless. Long days on the cattle drive. Camping under the stars. Don't sell a simple saddle (your product), sell a "lifestyle."
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