Angry Olive Consulting

09/02/2026

Some people know the person you were twenty years ago.

Some know the person you became afterward.

Some know the version of you who laughs harder, thinks differently, asks better questions, or says the thing you wouldn’t say anywhere else.

None of them knows all of you.

But none f them knows a false version of you, either.

I’ve been thinking about that.

Maybe different relationships don’t change who we are as much as they make different things in us visible.

We become visible differently through one another.

That’s the recognition at the heart of “The People We Keep Meeting.”

And perhaps there is someone in your life who knows a version of you that no one else does. Who comes to mind?

Read the full essay through the link in my bio.

09/01/2026

Think about the people who know you well.

Now think about how different you are with each of them.

There are people who bring out your curiosity. People who know your ridiculous side. People who challenge you. People around whom you become quieter. More thoughtful. More vulnerable.

None of those versions is false.

They're all you.

I've been thinking about what that might tell us—not only about our relationships, but about ourselves.

We become visible differently through one another.

"The People We Keep Meeting" - An Essay

The couch was orange.Not burnt orange. Not rust. Not some color that would eventually come back into fashion and be assigned “color of the year.”Orange.It was the 1970s. Apparently people did that to couches.The couch sat in the Family Room of the house on Manor Circle where my little brother, J...

08/25/2026

Because the greatest leaders aren't remembered for how indispensable they became.

"Why Great Leaders Want You To Outgrow Them"

Read the essay:

Every leader leaves an inheritance. The question is whether it contains seeds.The restaurant was still closed, just beginning to awaken for the day.The scent of polished wood lingered in the dining room, slowly overtaken by a fresh pot of coffee and the bread that had just been delivered from the ba...

08/18/2026

If you have spent enough time in restaurants, you know the moment.

Something goes wrong.

Maybe several things go wrong at once.

The board is filling up. A table has been waiting too long. Someone called out. A piece of equipment stops working at exactly the wrong time. The kitchen is getting buried, the dining room can feel it, and everyone begins looking toward the people in charge.

Not necessarily because they expect us to have an immediate answer.

Sometimes they are looking to us to understand how worried they should be.

That distinction matters.

Because pressure moves through a restaurant quickly.
And so does panic.

One of the most important responsibilities we have as leaders is learning the difference between carrying pressure and transferring it.

My newest essay, “Leadership In High Stakes Environments,” begins inside one of those moments.

But it explores something I believe extends well beyond a difficult service:

Leadership is not about pretending the stakes aren't high.

It isn't about being emotionless.

And it certainly isn't about having every answer before everyone else.

It is about helping create the conditions in which people can still think, communicate, make decisions, and do their best work when the pressure is very real.

For those of us who lead in hospitality, there may be no better
laboratory for learning how to do that.

I invite you to read the essay.

And when you come back, I'd genuinely like to hear from you:

When everything starts going sideways during service, what does your team experience from you?

The printer won’t stop.Click...whir...cut. Click...whir...cut. Click...whir...cut.Marcus has long since stopped hearing it as individual tickets. Somewhere around six o’clock, it always becomes background noise—a relentless rhythm that pulses through the restaurant like a second heartbeat.He t...

08/13/2026

We say it all the time. Hope is not a strategy. And we’re right.

The trouble may be that somewhere along the way, we started treating that as though it meant hope wasn’t useful.

But perhaps hope was never supposed to make the plan. Perhaps it gives us something else entirely.

This week’s “Become More True” began with a phrase I had heard countless times-and a recognition that made me hear it differently.

Hope is not a strategy-it is a gift.

I’d love to know what you recognize in it.

Full essay at the link in bio.

08/11/2026

There is a point when preparation can begin to feel like obligation.

Another budget. Another meeting. Another difficult conversation. Another schedule. Another service. Another problem that needs solving. Another day of being responsible for people who are depending on you.

Good leaders know that hope cannot replace any of that work.

Hope is not a strategy.

It doesn't balance the budget. It doesn't solve the difficult conversation. It doesn't build the culture.

But perhaps we've been asking hope to do a job it was never meant to do.

Hope isn't what replaces the preparation.

Hope is what reminds us why the preparation still matters.

Why another conversation is worth having. Why another team is worth building. Why another guest is worth welcoming. Why another season is worth beginning.

Not because success is guaranteed.

Because people are still worth preparing for.

My newest essay, Hope Is Not A Strategy — It Is A Gift, begins at Milwaukee County Stadium in October 1982.

But it isn't really a baseball story.

It's about leadership, hospitality, family, inheritance—and the people who quietly prepare places where hope can survive.

I'd love to share it with you.

One Question to Carry With You:
Who quietly prepared hope for you before you even knew you needed it...and whose hope are you preparing now?

It Is A GiftSome memories begin with what happened. Mine almost always begin with who was there.By noon, Jeffrey and I had already looked out the dining room window more times than we could count. Lunch was on the table. Our attention wasn't.Every few minutes one of us wandered back to the window, c...

08/04/2026

One of the biggest misconceptions about leadership is that it begins when people arrive.

The team meeting begins.

The guests walk through the front door.

The coaching session starts.

The interview begins.

The presentation starts.

In my experience...
the most meaningful part of leadership has already happened.
It's in the quiet preparation beforehand.

The leader who thought about their team before the meeting.

The restaurant that prepared for its guests long before the doors opened.

The coach who reflected before asking the first question.

The parent who quietly prepared a home where someone else could belong.

Preparation isn't simply planning.

It's one of the ways love—and leadership—become visible.

My newest essay, Preparation Is Love, explores that recognition through stories from restaurants, family, and everyday life.

Because leadership doesn't begin when people arrive.

It begins long before they do.

I'd love to hear your thoughts.

What is one way you've experienced thoughtful preparation from someone you respect?

The Most Meaningful Things We Do Happen Before Anyone ArrivesThe dining room was still empty.Outside, tires whispered across rain-darkened pavement as the city slowly woke. Morning light slipped through the front windows, caught the edges of the century-old chandeliers, and settled quietly across th...

07/30/2026

Over the years, I've learned that every operational challenge eventually becomes a leadership challenge. And every leadership challenge eventually becomes an identity challenge. That's why I've begun publishing a series of essays exploring the recognitions that shape how we lead, serve, and live.

For the past several years, I've been writing.

Not because I wanted to become an author.
Because there were ideas, stories, and recognitions that quietly refused to leave me alone.

Many of you have been part of that journey without even realizing it. Some of you have worked beside me. Some have shared a meal with me. Some have challenged me, encouraged me, or simply crossed my path at exactly the right moment.

Whether you knew it or not, you've helped shape the way I see leadership, hospitality, belonging, and what it means to become more fully ourselves.

Today, I'm sharing the first essay in what I hope becomes a lifelong body of work.

It's called Become More True.

It's not about becoming someone different.

It's about recognizing the gifts we've already been given—and choosing, every day, whether we'll keep them or give them away.

If you decide to read it, I hope it leaves you with one question:
What will people inherit because you were here?

Thank you for being part of my story.
I'd be honored to become a small part of yours.

The kitchen smelled faintly of coffee and toasted bagels. Morning light spilled through the window above the sink, splashing across the leaves of the hanging spider plant that framed the view into our backyard. About twenty feet beyond the windowpane stood a weathered, dark green birdbath.Every now....