Ari Weinzweig Featured Ari Weinzweig: The Spirit of Generosity; Founder of Zingerman's Deli, Breads, and Products

Some of the best businesses in the world have come to ZingTrain to learn about and adopt (or adapt) Zingerman’s approach to customer service. This is ZingTrain’s most popular training!

The center of Mario Batali’s “gastrodeli universe” and held in Saveur magazine’s highest regard for its service, Zingerman’s has taken its national accolades into the world of training and consulting with ZingTrain.

Great service is a cornerstone of Zingerman’s success. Zingerman’s has earned its reputation for great service by intentionally creating an organizational culture that nurtures great service and by teaching each and every one of its employees the recipes that the organization has developed for great service – namely the 3 steps to giving great service and the 5 steps to effectively handling customer complaints.

Every leader knows how challenging it is to create a culture that keeps their employees engaged, inspired, focused on a common goal and bringing their best selves to work. Ari calls the apathy and distrust that emerge when the culture flounders "The Energy Crisis in the American Workplace". In this inspiring and thought provoking keynote, Ari will introduce the 12 Natural Laws of Business from his first book in the Guide to Good Leading Series. He'll explain why operating in violation of the Laws is creating this energy crisis. And he'll present powerfully simple and meaningful ways to help your organization live within the Natural Laws and become more successful and sustainable, all while creating positive lives for your employees and customers!

Although most of us don’t realize it, our beliefs have a major impact on how things go in our lives. What we believe may or may not be true, but unknowingly most of us will behave in ways that reinforce our beliefs anyways. In this Keynote Address, Ari will take a look at how our beliefs play out in our day to day experiences in the workplace, and how we and our workplaces are impacted by those beliefs. Whether we accept it or not, what we believe about ourselves, about our organization, our co-workers, our boss, the work that we do and our ability to do it will significantly alter the outcomes we are seeking to achieve. Best of all, Ari will address how by becoming more mindful of our beliefs, we can effectively alter them and change the way we see our work and the world. And radically later the outcomes we get from our efforts.

Ari makes the assertion that you can build your bottom lines by building generosity into your work.

Fully aware that it's counter-intuitive - how can you give more away and get more? - Ari goes on to make the case with his usual thorough research. And shares 22 techniques you can use to weave generosity into your work.

• BUILD the case for building generosity into your business.
• SHARE his favorite of the 22 techniques so you can too!

You get 494 million hits when you Google the phrase “Leadership”. It drops to a significantly more manageable 128 million when you change the phrase to “Leadership Development”. A good few of them probably have something worth learning or adopting.

Ultimately though, you become aware that what you choose to adopt and disregard is based on your answer to the question : What kind of leader do I want to be? What kind of leaders do we want in our organization?

At Zingerman’s, over the course of over 30 years of growing and thriving, we’ve created a clear vision of what our idea of great Leadership is. It’s based on Robert Greenleaf’s idea of Servant Leadership. The basic belief of Servant Leadership is that, we, as leaders, are here – first and foremost – to serve our organizations. We’ve also developed a teachable and effective system for it. And we think it works. Here’s why :

“It is a true gift to be a leader within Zingerman’s Community of Businesses; to have the freedom to be a true leader and be true to yourself. Not that there isn’t pressure, but the pressure is largely self-imposed to live up to the expectations we have set for ourselves and our organization. In my 25-plus-year career, I have never felt more appreciated, engaged, challenged, and rewarded.

The Denison Consulting group, who know a thing or two about the organizational culture of successful business, concluded in a 2010 survey that:

• Companies that use Open Book Management consistently rank in the top 10% of all companies surveyed.
• Zingerman’s was in the top 10% amongst companies that practiced Open Book.

So what is Open Book Management? A radical approach to running a business, Open Book management is about empowering every single employee in your business with the tools, education and data they need to act (and take responsibility) like owners.

Open Book is not a spectator sport - it’s not just about showing people all the numbers.

Transparency is great but this is about actually taking charge, not just taking time to look at some financial spreadsheets that management was nice enough to share with you. Open Book is about everyone participating in running the business – it’s about people understanding how the whole organization works and their role in it, it’s about accountability, collaboration, and taking initiative. It’s about looking forward and working together to win.

It’s more fun, it’s more interesting, and the bottom line is it just plain works.