Kris Hall with the Burnt Chef Project

Great conversation with Kris Hall, who is the founder of the Burnt Chef Project, talking about the mental health issues of many people in the Hospitality Industry.   It doesn't need to be how it has been in the past.  There is focus now more than ever to change the culture and stresses in the industry.   

Transcript

Nan Wilkinson: 0:08

Welcome to restaurant radio, a podcast that focuses on topics that affect influence and matter to those of us in the hospitality and restaurant industry. I'm your host, Nan Wilkinson. Hi, everybody, welcome back to restaurant radio. My guest today is Chris Hall. He is an industry veteran of many different aspects from working in the business, supplying the business, doing sales and marketing for folks in the industry. And as well aware of what we've got going on here in the industry, and is the creator of the burnt chef project. Chris, thank you so much for being here today.

Kris Hall: 0:48

Thank you ever so much for having me from from blustery England today. I love it. Thank you so much. So you know, it's interesting that you just mentioned that. So I think what's very interesting to me is that the issues that we have in our industry are not just specifically to the folks here in the United States. But what I'm seeing when I'm part of like, I joined the burnt chef project, as you know, as one of the folks who was interested in this, and there's other ones out there, others that you partner with as well, in other parts of the world. And, you know, this is not just to one particular country, but issues that are all over the world is part of the hospitality industry. Yeah, I mean, I think that's one of the great, both one of the great things, and one of the things that we need to tackle which is, if you work front of house or back a house in hospitality, you can work anywhere in the world, if you've honed your skills, or even if you've dipped your toe in the water in the UK, you can go to Canada, America, Spain, wherever it may be, and pick up a job fairly easily. Because you know what hospitality is like, that's one of the great things about it, it's it is completely transferable the world over. And that's why it's a profession of choice. However, with that being said, because of the brigade systems, because of the ways in which we worked for such a long period of time, you tend to see the same practices, the same common themes running throughout hospitality worldwide as well. So some of the things are really great, you know, diversity, a whole range of creative individuals. But unfortunately, one of the things that we see quite frequently are high levels of stress, very poor work life balance, and a real skill gap shortage in terms of leadership, qualities and skills as well. And unfortunately, no matter what country you're in, that tends to be fairly synonymous with a younger hospitality industry, but I'm pleased to say is changing quite rapidly. Yeah, I think that's absolutely true. I think the change was when we were primed for that, like that it needed to happen. Anyway, I know, I've been in the industry over 40 years. And, of course, there's way way, way more businesses out there and more need for employees. But, you know, these underlying sort of issues have been there all along. Like you said, it's an amazing industry. I mean, we talked about the hospitality industry, and how being hospitable and you think, Oh, this is fun, and it is a very creative industry. But it is fast pace. And some of that, again, can be very fun, if you're working in the back of the house, and you're working with folks that you get along with and that work well and are all prepared. You know, it's it's like a well oiled machine. It's just it's a lot of fun to do that. But if you don't, or you've got management, that's not great. Or you're dealing with customers out front that are unruly, it can be awful, quite honestly. And so.

Nan Wilkinson: 3:47

Yeah, I mean, I think that I think there's a lot of things that we need to tackle, but but let's talk specifically kind of about what you're trying to tackle. Tell us a little bit about, you kind of already mentioned, but how the burnt chef project came about?

Kris Hall: 4:02

Yeah, certainly. So the Berkshire project was founded back in May 2019. And, again, one of the great things about hospitality is our students didn't get kitchen and you tend to have quite quite interesting and deep conversations, whilst whilst the me's on blast is being done, not during service, of course, but Right. So I'd had I'd had a recent bout of mental illness myself in my late 20s. And after a couple of years of recovery, I started to look at my friends, my colleagues, my peers in the industry and going no one in hospitality seems to experience mental illness because no one's talking about it. So you know, what's the secret and you know, friends of mine were going well we do have it we just get on with it. We just don't talk about it. You know, we're, we use coping mechanisms such as we work longer hours or we drink or take drugs or we gamble all of these other reports. some behaviors that we see quite commonly within hospitality. And I said, But why? Why is it like that? And they're like, well, that's just the way it is. You're never going to change your career. So don't tell it's always been. Yeah, that's how it's always been. And I always say that the burnt chef project should have been called, that's just the way it is. Because that is what I got told time and time again. And I, to me, there was something inside me, that said, you got to do something about this, even if it was just at a local level. So that for you, one of the things I had started doing was taking photographs, as a form of mindfulness. For me, it was also a revenue stream, I was taking food photography quite frequently. And I started to take some black and white photos of people to really show that more goes on behind the scenes and than you might think, and to talk about the shadows to talk about what's going on in the shadows, right at first. So I coerced one of my mates. I said, Look, can I have a photo taken? Shafi was like, Yeah, sure. crossed his arms, got in front of the camera, took his boat. It was like, yes, really good bit moody. But I like it. I said, Will you share it for me? And he said, Yeah, I'll share it on social media. What's it for? And I said, was to raise awareness for mental health? Is I card? No, don't put that anywhere. I don't want my face associated with that subject. I'm not weak. I'm not a snowflake. I said, Well, you have mental health mate,we all have mental we all have mental health.

Nan Wilkinson: 6:26

Amen. Yes, yeah.

Kris Hall: 6:28

And this is just really to raise awareness for that matter. Oh, I'm not comfortable, or whatever, what my friends say. And that was a really, really interesting thing. But what had happened is over a period of time these photos started to get shared. And there was this underlying hum of individuals who would reach out and they would go, can I have my photo taken? And you just say, Yes, don't there's no questions needed to be asked? They would, you'd meet them in the storeroom, you'd meet them behind the past during the mid service, and you would take their photo, and it was only after that photo being taken, they would say, I tried to end my life recently, or, you know, I've been depressed for the last four years, or, you know, all of these stories would start to come out. And so from that moment on, I was like, This is so much more than than just Dorset, just the south coast of England, and people started contacting me from all around the world saying, Can I have my photo taken? These are the problems, this is what I'm facing. And from then on out, it's just been an absolute, just, it's just a tidal wave of seeing issues and trying to provide solutions, through education, through support, through awareness, whatever it is, that I think may help, and that we hear from feedback from our community, will then put in place to try and turn that tide.

Nan Wilkinson: 7:54

I, I love this, I love this so much. And as you're telling this story, I can totally relate. I mean, I think that, especially if you're talking the back of the house, in restaurants and stuff, I think most of us like to think of ourselves as part of my language. Badass is, you know, like, I'm tough, and I can handle anything. And there are a lot of amazing badass people. But like you said, Everybody's got mental health, and especially during this whole pandemic. I mean, I think the awareness that mental health doesn't have, I mean, doesn't have to mean something bad or something negative or have a derogatory connotation, but that it can be something that we're aware of, and how to work with one another. And I think, in our lifetime, if somebody said to me, I've never had any, quote, unquote, mental health issues, I would call probably call BS on that. Because I think at some point, everybody's like, we have some struggles. And, you know, some of us may be able to cope with it better, or pull through it better or have better support systems. But I do think that our industry has made it so normal that it's almost like, yeah, you know, it's like, that's just the badge of honor that we wear. That's absolutely awful. absolutely awful. And I think that you're addressing it and seeing that, like you said, people start coming out of the woodwork. They're almost like, not desperate for help. Or like, Yeah, me too. Me too. And feeling like Oh, thank goodness that other people are coming forward. And this is the,

Kris Hall: 9:25

this is the thing, right? Like, all you have to do is log on to a chef's Facebook page. You know, when these Facebook groups and they're like, oh, heard we lost one of our brothers or sisters today. You know, they took their own life. And it's almost like, I'm sorry, but where did this become the military? Where where is laying our life on the line for and let's be frank, cooking for people and providing drinks for people and service to people. Why does that? Well, how has that happened? Yeah. And so yeah, there are a hell of a lot of people out there who are experiencing difficulty with their mental health and And that's further exacerbated by stigma that we've got this macho culture of not, you know, not showing any signs of weakness or letting abrogate down. And it needs to change. Because until it changes, our alternative rates are going to be high, our loss of life is just going to be sickening, quite frankly. And we're going to kill our industry from the inside out, we need to start looking at right how we make it sustainable by focusing on

Nan Wilkinson: 10:28

people. We I mean, we already are sort of killing an industry, I don't know what it's like for you guys there. But I think it's kind of worldwide. Again, we are so understaffed here in this country, I mean, businesses are actually shutting down, shifts are shutting down, because they just can't get enough people. And we can't get enough people. Yes, it is across most industries. But we have kind of done this to ourselves in this industry. And we're not attracting new people. But we're also losing the people that we have, whether again, it's you know, hopefully not through loss of life, but just through people going, I'm done with this, I'm not putting up with this anymore. And so this shift has to happen, I mean, it's going to happen one way or the other, whether it's again, having less businesses to have to work at, or figuring out a way to, to make the people in the industry, the employees of focus. And so, again, good on you for doing that. So one of the things I've done through help connects is I'm trying to create a platform where people where I'm trying to elevate and set the businesses and the employees apart so that we can kind of partly to make the best connections, because not every job is right for every person, but also to sort of see those businesses that are take better care of their employees and find those better employees, and so we get better matches. And that rising tide will lift all the boats and, and that's my dream there. But one of the things I'm really proud of that I've done. And I know that, you know, health care in most countries is free. But it's it's not here in the United States. But I reached out to one of the largest health care companies called United Healthcare. And I said, how can you help me partner with the healthcare with the hospitality industry and bring something to the table that can help people and what we did is for here in the United States, and I don't know if it's available elsewhere, but for just $9 a month per employee, you can get telehealth, which again, it's not the end all, but here's the coolest part of it. So it'll help you with a lot of different things I've used it, it's so for $9 a month, you can get your employee on it, you can get they can get their spouse and their kids on it for no additional charge. And it's unlimited visits. But the best part of it, Chris is that it's not just for like, you know, pinkeye, or sore throat or whatever, it's mental health visits, like you can get endless mental health visits for no extra charge. And because of all the issues, I think, how amazing is that no co pays nothing else$9 A month, per employee, as much of that sort of stuff as as someone might need. And, you know, could just be like, Oh, my gosh, I'm stressed out, or partners driving me crazy, or whatever it might be, you can get these visits for free. So anyway, I'm just excited about that, to bring that to the folks here in the hospitality industry. So because we need to have people to get support, and it shouldn't cost an arm and a leg.

Kris Hall: 13:12

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. I'm completely with that. I mean, we've got a very robust system here, over in the UK, whereby we've got a free tech support system. And we've just launched something similar, which is like a free counseling app and a well being fitness and well being Mental Hygiene app that allows people to connect immediately to things that will help manage their health because we're not trained, and we're not taught how to look after our mental health, right, and also access to qualified therapists, the same therapist every single day. And we've we've got a really robust system here and the Thrive Thrive element I've just spoken about. We've recently opened up in nine different languages around the world as well, because you're exactly right, we need to do more to tackle. I mean, our stats say four out of five hospitality professionals have experienced at least one mental health issue during their career. And that was from close to 1300 respondents. So we need to do more about being able to support these individuals, first and foremost, triage those who may need assistance, but then start to educate and you use the analogy of a rising tide and bringing the boats up together. I use one that's quite similar, which is it's gonna take a lot of us to turn around a massive cruise liner. It's not like turning a dinghy round where we can spin on the circle. Now we're going to need multiple organizations multiple support mechanisms as much of a voice to reach around 72 million people worldwide. In hospitality it's possible in this bloody boat around because yeah,

Nan Wilkinson: 14:53

it is. And I don't know the statistics there in in the UK, but I know that here in this country, the The substance abuse is highest in the hospitality industry, of any other industry. And so again, like you said earlier, it's kind of, I believe, part and parcel to all of that, and just trying to figure out the solution. So, with that, what is Burt chef? Doing? Bringing awareness? What are things that y'all are doing to help with folks with mental health issues?

Kris Hall: 15:27

Well, where to begin? My, my, my team. So at this time last year, there was two of us, and we're now up to 17 of us in this team.

Nan Wilkinson: 15:38

Congratulations.

Kris Hall: 15:39

Thank you. Yeah, it's been, it's been it's been a ride. The problem is, is that my brain never stops. I think that's a trait of hospitality, right? You can't.

Nan Wilkinson: 15:52

Yeah, I can relate.

Kris Hall: 15:54

So, I mean, what started off as taking photos to raise awareness then became selling merchandise around the world to raise funds, you know, T shirts, hoodies, hats, jackets. And those funds were then released to allow us to provide free elearning, which is available all around the world. So elearning on diversity, inclusion, nutrition, sleep, menopause, we just launched one on how to help someone within your organization who may be going through menopause. And we're going to be looking at another one, to help those who may be experiencing menopause and how to raise that with their managers. So that a lot of the funds we raised through our E commerce and fundraising platforms go into those free to access services. In terms of awareness, we have a podcast ourselves, you know, we more recently, I ordered a three meter tall, black inflatable elephant. So I love it. Ellie is our is our official 18th member of our team. And we wanted something that because people are still getting exec chefs had been in the game for 30 years crossing their arms and telling me, Look, if someone's unwell, they should just think more positively. And that will help that will help that will certainly fix them. And I thought you're not Ouch, no. So what better way then to have a three meter tall inflatable elephant. So when they walk into one of my training sessions, they have to walk around this thing, and they physically have to squish past its trunk? Hug it to get passed? And then why is that?

Nan Wilkinson: 17:27

Because there's an elephant in the room? Exactly. I love it. We think like, yeah, with that. Yeah, exactly. It's, it's the thing that no one really wants to talk about. But it's, it is definitely an elephant in the room. Yeah,

Kris Hall: 17:41

exactly. Three meats to La le the elephant. We have a free text number over here, plus our M subscript subscription support service, the subscription support services worldwide. And we're looking at launching a free tech service in America and Canada, which, if I'm honest, is just a service that already exists, but we're going to label it up, make sure that people know in hospitality, it's for them, and offer that for free as well. And we do a lot of corporate training. Now a lot of training around mental health awareness how to manage mental health, if it's in your business as well, because a lot of employers are now feeling paralyzed, that they can't do anything, especially with a lot of younger generation candidates in the business now and going, I have anxiety I'm going to take today off and if you need me, don't find me, then they'll come back the next day and be like, I'm still anxious today. So I'm gonna take the time off. And that might be very well and good. But there has to be. This is a professional world, right? This is a professional industry. And so there has to be that, that understanding that equilibrium that yin yang, from between employers and employees to say, You know what, okay, you might be unwell. But this is your fourth instance. No, we're gonna have to have a performance review about this. So we have training around that financial health, we have training. Over here in the UK, we have Mental Health First Aid training, which we provide hospitality specific versions of, and there's just a whole host. It sounds

Nan Wilkinson: 19:11

like, we just love it. I love it a lot more. So I know you said the phone number. The text number is not necessarily available here in the US yet. But are the training classes or is that something people can access pretty easily?

Kris Hall: 19:26

Yeah, so the elearning is available on our website, you can head over to the burnt Chef project.com website. Okay, you're looking out for the burnt chef Academy. Okay, I think got now about close to 16 modules on health and well being which you free to access, we don't charge a penny for that literally reinvest all of our profits back into it. In terms of our more popular corporate training, we can do that virtually as well. So do that over a sort of a two or three hour session. So we're finding especially with our unique way, as well. very rare that you'll get someone talking to you about health and safety and dropping the F bomb in a few times. Because that's what people understand. Right. That's hospitality. There's no airs and graces about as we say how it is. So, yeah, we we find that we've we're working with some of the major brands over here currently. And we're finding out that will travel well, virtually as well.

Nan Wilkinson: 20:21

No, that's fantastic. Have you heard of fear kitchens?

Kris Hall: 20:24

Yes. Yeah, I'm good friends with Alex actually from

Nan Wilkinson: 20:28

okay. Okay, excellent. Yeah, I've talked with them as well. So I'm trying to do some projects with him as well, and would love to try to do something with you all, or help over here out however I can. This is, like I said, it's definitely something that needs to be addressed. And I think that if we're going to turn that big boat around, like you said, it's going to take a massive amount of people. And it's going to take us a little time. And the sooner we can all get on board and you know, start paddling in one direction, you know, we can make those changes happen faster.

Kris Hall: 21:00

Yeah, right. But it is happening. We asked Yeah. Oh, yeah. Crew? Yeah. I mean, we work with a massive brand over here, they've got 680 sites, which might not sound like much but you know, bearing in mind, yeah, the great British Isles, a tiny. And within just six months of working with them, they've already implemented strategic changes based on our training based on the feedback from our partnership. And it's amazing to see, and yeah, they're, you know, not just see, but their well being scores, that actual data and metrics are improving. So it is happening, that's great. Well, that get on board, the more people that start following with this, not just from a human being level, but from a business level, you're gonna start to see much healthier, more profitable, more sustainable businesses.

Nan Wilkinson: 21:49

Absolutely. I would agree with that. So would you say that this is sort of the biggest thing that we need to tackle in our industry? Because I believe that, you know, obviously, the people that are here need that support that are already in the industry. But because it's been a pretty toxic place to be, and we haven't focused on the employee. I believe as much as we should. We are, we're just not seeing not only are people not coming into the industry, but again, over here, they're they're leaving the industry at double the rate that any other employees leaving any other industry. So do you believe that this is kind of the main thing that we need to tackle right now in order to not only not lose people, but to attract people back to our industry or into our industry?

Kris Hall: 22:36

The short answer? Yes. The long answer is, it's not that simple. So what started off as me trying to raise awareness for mental illness and mental health, and thinking that the quickest fix would be to promote a four three working week has seen us become experienced and a lot more areas. So when we work with businesses now, we don't specifically aim to tackle mental health and certainly tackle mental illness as as a subject matter. If that's an area of focus, then we're all on board for that. But what we're most interested in is getting to the root cause of why high levels of stress and mental illness are occurring in the first place. It's no good putting a plaster on a cup that's got glass in it, and hoping it magically Hills is not going to do that until you rip that plaster off, you pull that glass out, and then you stitch it back up again. So what we're seeing now is we're working with a lot of businesses on coach tool changes, you know, understanding exactly what's going on culturally. Do you have any onboarding? What are your retention rates? Like? I mean, like, the average turnover rates in hospitality is something ridiculous, like 125%. In fact, businesses are targeted on 125%. Now, let's put that into normal day terms. If you've got a team of 100, your targeted your targeted to lose 125 of your team. Within one year, you're targeted to get rid of everyone plus an additional 25. Yeah, so yeah, you know, until we start addressing that, until we start looking at those things, you're gonna find that your turnover rates are high. And unfortunately, stress mental illness is just one of the byproducts. Yeah,

Nan Wilkinson: 24:26

no, I, again, I agree with you wholeheartedly. So, you know, I kind of make the analogy a couple of different times on my podcast. So when I had a bakery and deli I remember one specific year, when we were handing out the WTS at the end of the year, at any given time, we may have had 12 full time employees, right. At the end of the year, I had this humongous stack of W twos. And I'm like, I get any remember most of these people's names. It's like they were there for such a short amount of time. And I've handed literally handed checks to people and thought to myself, I'll never see them again. You know, and that's, that's awful and Do I was I a bad boss? Or? I? You know, who knows? I don't think so. But anyway, I do think that that's, you know, and you said, onboarding, it almost kind of made me laugh, because it's like, that's probably non existent. And most of the business, most of the restaurants and hotels, and especially now, with people being so short handed, I mean, they're just throwing people into jobs, and not even helping them be able to succeed. You know, we're not setting people up for success. And so, again, this is a long time coming. And there are a lot of different things that that need to be looked at. It's funny, because people here now think, well, I'm paying them X amount of dollars, like, where are they, that's, that's too, you're too late on the money part, like the money should be a given like we shouldn't even be discussing that you're paying people a decent wage, like, Don't even talk to me about that, just do it. And now let's talk about the real issues like, that's the other part that drives me crazy. It's like, if we turned around tomorrow, and paid everybody a living wage here in the United States, and gave everybody health care, and a four, three week or whatever you want to call it, there still would not be enough people that wanted to come into this industry, to even start to help because people now are just looking at our industry going, no thanks. Because we've just It's been too long that we've had, you know, a, we've got a bad taste in people's mouth. And so it's going to take a bit for us to shine again,

Kris Hall: 26:25

it's going to take at the end of the day, and this is what I say to all the people that I train, I can stand up in front of here ranting rioting, I can give you the paradigm shifts, and the perception tilts in order for you to think about things differently. But I'm not in I'm not at the coalface I'm not working in a business anymore. This is up for every single one of anyone who's in hospitality. And no matter what guys you are in, to start celebrating and recognizing what is good, and what is positive. And being the instigator of change the agent of change. Because at this moment in time, if I stand up in front of a room of 30 people, all within hospitality and I say to them, how many of you want your children to work in this sector? No one will put their hand up. And how can we expect anyone else? How can we expect other parents from different industries to allow their children to want to work in this, if we're the ones trying to set it on fire from the inside? Yeah. So understand that there are great things happening, it's not always going to be the way that it is. And it's only you that I was able to make that change, invest into yourself, invest into your time. And if you feel that you're not getting the respect or the time that you deserve, don't move for 50 cents down the road, don't move for an extra dollar an hour, because quite frankly, you're just going to end up doing more hours and get treated even more rubbish. Find a business that values you Right, exactly time and your energy and your expertise, and allows you to have a amicable relationship rather than a one sided one.

Nan Wilkinson: 28:00

Yeah. And that's, that's hopefully what that's the plan of what my websites trying to do sort of, you know, bring those businesses and people to the forefront. And I know here in this, this country, they're also trying to they the National Restaurant Association is trying to help people understand that there's also a career path, because I think it's the other thing that we haven't done very well, it's like, you know, and I know many people who started out as dishwashers, or bus people, or whatever, and own their own businesses now and are, you know, do quite well. But those stories are pretty rare. And at least they're not out there so people can see and get excited about it. But, Chris, I just want to tell you, thank you so much for being here today, and for taking the time to be on the podcast. If there's anything that I can do here to help you guys or help get the word out. I'm here and if there's anything we can do together, just let me know. And, again, just appreciate so much what you're doing and trying to help our industry.

Kris Hall: 29:00

Thank you. Well, I'll be in touch soon because we are working in the background on an accreditation scheme. So similarly to what you have currently. But we're going to base it on data and metrics so that we can benchmark someone when they come to us, we can answer what they have in place in terms of policies in terms of retention rates. And then we can using psychologists find out where their biggest heat he points are, where the biggest risks are, well, and then work with them to accurately tackle that to improve it. And then once we know there's an improvement there, and once we know it's at acceptable levels, we can then promote them and we need people like yourself to be able to say, You know what, these are businesses that I can fully endorse and that I think should go through this process. So yeah, let's pick up this after the call.

Nan Wilkinson: 29:50

No, that's that's really great. I think that's fantastic. And all my website, businesses, currently just for the businesses, they can get badges and the badges against what have set them apart. And they're part of the job posting, you can see these badges and see if it matters to you, right? If some, you know, whatever those badges might be, so we can absolutely add something like that to the website. And I love that. And I'm also through social media, highlighting those businesses that are doing the right things and saying, here's why you should take a look at this business because of X and such. And so that's all about what I'm trying to do. So this is exciting. Well, Chris, thank you again, so much. there's anything I can do let me know and I can appreciate you being on our podcast.

Kris Hall: 30:31

Wonderful. Thanks, Nan. Cheers.

Nan Wilkinson: 30:33

Thank you. Take care.