The day of the super bowl, after the Saints won, I came across this show “Undercover Boss” which runs on CBS on Sunday nights at 9:00PM EST. I watched the story of waste management and now I am a subscriber, I will be watching this show every Sunday as much as I can.
About the Show:
The real essence of the show is to capture CEO/Presidents of major companies stepping down from their title for a week and go work at the plant level of their companies in order to get a better understanding of what’s going on in the business. I think this show helps to show what true leaders are made up of. They are not the best, they don’t always know what’s going on in their businesses but they are willing to find out.
The Hooters Story – 2/14/2010
In last night’s episode, CEO/President of Hooters, Cody Brooks, had a meeting with his executive board and informed them that he would step down as CEO/President for a week to go under cover within his own organization. He visited many Hooters restaurants and tried to understand what was going on, he wanted to view the company which his father left him from a different perspective, not to mention his sales were going down so he needed to see how it is he could better the brand.
The first restaurant he went to, the manager was on his game because he kept everything under control, he had Cody work hard just like any other of the people working there. Also, Cody changed his name to Scotty to keep his identity a secret. On his first day at that Hooters restaurant Cody was let go because he didn’t perform well and he was working much too slow.
At the second restaurant he visited, he wanted to find out what people thought of about Hooters. So he basically went out on a promotion with two of the hooter’s girls and was giving out free chicken wings and while speaking to some of the people on the street he found out that many people mostly women thought the Hooters’ uniform was just degrading to women, which was one of their reasons for not going to eat at the restaurant.
At the third restaurant, the manager there was just a complete Jerk especially to the young women working there, he didn’t respect or treat the women that worked there as human beings, rather as just puppets or properties. He went as far as making the girls eat beans as a contest to allow them to leave early. The girls didn’t appreciate it but they wanted to leave early so they found themselves doing something they really didn’t want to do.
At the last restaurant Cody visited, he met with a female manager, she was more of a mother figure to the women that worked there, she treated all of the ladies with respect and she worked really hard. Cody had asked the manager is there really a big difference between her and a male manager. She explained to him that, she understands the women that works there better because she was once a Hooters’ girl and also she’s a mother.
The final thought, he called up all the people that he met with during his week of undercover work and revealed himself to them. They were all shocked, some pleasantly and well the manager that was acting like a jerk not so much. For those that worked hard, like the mother, he gave her an all expensed paid trip to anywhere she wanted to go, the other hardworking manager, got a $50,000 check given to a military charity in his name, and well the other manager had to go an apologize to all of his workers. At the end Cody decided that he would do a campaign to have people understand more of what the hooter’s brand is about and how he can change and make the company better.
The End!