From Nomad to Regional Director of Operations

(MY FRANCHISE JOURNEY, PART 8)

Back in 1995, while I was in Brazil, my Direct Supervisor, Francisca, called me to share the news that I was being promoted to Regional Director of Operations for Domino's Pizza for Central America and the Caribbean. That meant I would move to Miami and get settled there for good.

That’s how, after three years of being a Nomad Franchise Executive, I was finally going home, getting an apartment, a closet, and a car I could call my own. You have no idea how amazing that was! 

Don't get me wrong—I loved my years abroad as a nomad, but I was excited about the promotion and settling down. And I would still travel in this new role because I was responsible for nine countries: Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, plus the Cayman Islands, the Bahamas, and the Dominican Republic in the Caribbean. 

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As you learned in the previous blog posts about my franchise journey, I had already worked with some of these Master Franchisees, and we had built a strong relationship with them and their teams. But this time, when I went back to those countries, I was no longer there to handle day-to-day operational issues or a specific assignment.

I was there as their Regional Director of Operations to provide support and assistance and serve as the liaison between the Franchisees and headquarters for any needs they had. And of course, also accountability, making sure that the brand standards were being kept.

Even though I could send people to my countries to help the Master Franchisees with certain assignments, I truly enjoyed being the one there with them, so I decided to travel every other week. Since I already knew them well, I knew how to support them in the best way possible. This was an amazing time of my life. 

Globalizing a Franchise Brand

I learned something critical during this phase of my career. 

In this new role, I was responsible for ensuring the brand continued to be executed consistently, using the same systems and the same processes from start to finish. And, yes: some things were a little bit different because of the tropicalization of the country. For example, some procedures differed because the menu changed slightly.

• However, for a brand to be successful globally, certain core brand standards and principles are non-negotiable and must remain the same no matter where you are.

If a customer visits a store in the United States, they should receive the same experience when they visit Brazil, Nicaragua, or the Dominican Republic, or at least a very, very close one to the one in the US.

A brand is a promise of consistency. And that promise should be delivered regardless of the country. That’s critical when you are globalizing a franchise brand.

A SWOT Analysis Revelation

I had already lived in many of the countries I was responsible for, and I knew the Franchisees very well. However, I hadn't been in some of these places in two, maybe three years, so I wanted to start from scratch to clearly understand where they stood and what we needed to do to position the brand better. 

So, I toured the countries to do a structured SWOT analysis and identify the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats for each country. I did this in collaboration with the Master Franchisee or the leadership team running the brand there, so I could understand what they needed and personalize the best way to support them and their teams to be successful. 

One thing that the SWOT analysis revealed in many of these countries was a lack of bench planning. Many Franchisees were growing, but their growth was limited because they didn't have the leaders to manage the new units they were opening.

They desperately needed to develop those leaders, but I couldn’t go to each country, and we didn't have enough staff to help Franchisees develop them. 

The Central American Summit Training

To address this big issue, I decided to organize a Central American Summit for all the Franchisees and their managers or leaders from the six countries in Central America (so I could do it in Spanish). My goal was to run a two-week training program to prepare each of those men and women to become Training Managers back in their own countries.

The Summit was hosted in Guatemala, my home country, so I stayed with my family and saved some money (I’ve always been very responsible with the company's and the Franchisee's money).

The response was incredible! And I don’t really know how, but the news of what we were doing got to people in South America, who contacted me to see if they could send people to the training. So, we ended up having a couple of people from Colombia and Peru join us at the Summit. 

And so, I prepared this two-week workshop, which was a mix of in-store and classroom training, applying everything that I had learned about adult education and adult learning in all the countries I visited as a nomad, bringing it all together into this in-person, intensive training. I put together a big binder with all the procedures and processes they had to learn so that they could take it with them as their training tool for each of their respective countries. 

The training covered the brand systems (product, service, image) to set standards and make sure we were clear on them. But we spent the majority of the time on what we call the business systems, which included all the business management systems, processes, and procedures that they needed to have to be able to develop these leaders in their countries, such as:

• How to do the inventory.
• How to do food orders.
• How to do scheduling.
• How to manage labor costs.
• How to manage cost of goods.
• How to understand KPIs and dashboards.
• How to recruit, interview, hire, and onboard team members.

By the way, if this is something you think your company needs, this is exactly what we teach in our MANAGE Program.

It didn't dawn on me until I was preparing this blog post: this two-week training we did back in Guatemala for this Summit, back in 1997, is exactly what we teach in the unit management program, which is a virtual, guided training program where we teach the managerial principles that never change no matter what business, brand, or industry you’re running.

Going through my own story and sharing these journey blog posts with you has made me realize how long I have actually been doing franchise training, developing an understanding of how people learn, and what’s the best way to transmit knowledge, data, systems, and processes clearly. It’s just amazing!

Mission, Accomplished

I held the Regional Director of Operations role for about two years. During those months, we were able to advance the standards and processes across the nine countries I supervised. Brand audit outcomes improved significantly, as did profitability and success for all those Franchisees. 

Another success metric was that we did not change any Master Franchisee while I was there, which is very common in global or international franchising, especially when a Master Franchisee fails. But under my direction, we were able to support these Master Franchisees with their specific needs so they could succeed in their countries.

Not only that. Thanks to the Summit we created, we were able to help them build a stronger leadership structure and develop a solid bench for their growth plans.

I had accomplished my goals, and I didn’t want to travel anymore. I wanted to be in one place, so I looked for a job at the Domino’s headquarters. I even told my Franchisees that I was open to job offers, as long as it meant I could stay in that country for good.

I wanted a home base, to support one organization, and to help them succeed. But I’ll share the offers I received and which country I decided to move to permanently in a future blog post. 

Four Lessons From My Regional Director’s Phase

As I’ve done throughout these journey blog posts, before I finish, I want to share the lessons I learned in this particular time of my life:

1. The importance of mid-to-long-term planning

When I had assignments as a nomad, I only had to focus on what I could do and accomplish in the next two to three months because my assignments were short and mostly met immediate needs. 

But this phase of my career was different. I was now working and collaborating with Master Franchisees who had big development goals and plans, and during the SWOT analysis, our conversations focused on mid-term and long-term planning and what they needed to do to prepare for sustainable, successful growth. 

I developed the ability to conduct in-depth business analysis to identify and understand the unique opportunities in each country. In one country, the opportunity may have involved culture; in another, training and development; in another, capital expenditures or general and administrative investments; or perhaps strengthening the supply chain to support growth.

2. The importance of trust and building relationships

I would say that one of the reasons I was successful in this role was that I got to develop and maintain a relationship of trust, support, and care with all the Franchisees I worked with. While some of them already knew me from when I lived and worked in their countries as a nomad, the new ones quickly learned how committed I was to their success. 

So, when I needed anything from them, or something significant had to be done, they trusted me enough to do it and make that investment because they knew I really, truly had their best interest at heart. 

• This, by the way, is still true today. The American Franchise Academy exists because we are committed to protecting the American dream of business ownership through franchising. 

What I want to do is help and protect every single Franchisee who comes into our world so they can keep that dream alive and sustain it long term for themselves and their families. That has not changed. 

3. Your reputation precedes you

If those who knew about the Summit hadn’t heard good things about me and what I delivered, I don't think they would have reached out to have their people participate in our Summit. 

Think about it! Sending leaders from Peru and Colombia for a two-week training in Guatemala meant a significant investment in airfare, meals, hotels, and accommodation. So they had to trust me enough, and also trust that the education they were going to receive from me was high value and what they needed to go back to their countries and thrive and succeed. 

If my reputation hadn't been what it was, they never would have made that investment.

I really honor and appreciate that, and I try to live up to it even today, because I know Franchisees don't have a whole lot of money to throw away. Everything we do is to the best of our abilities, and I know we give more than a 10x return on the investment they make in our academy.

4. We all want the same

The last thing I want to share that was a learning from this particular time of my career is that we all want the same thing. Whether you are in the Cayman Islands, in Peru, in Nicaragua, or in Guatemala… everybody wants to be respected, to grow, to learn, to belong, to have opportunities, and to be better tomorrow than we were yesterday. 

I truly believe we are all capable of amazing things, and those opportunities will come if we’re willing to do the work to make them happen. What differentiates us is how we choose to behave, and that's a choice.

So, my goal as a leader has always been to bring out the best in people, because even though people may not always behave that way, we all want the opportunity to be better and have a better life in the future. It’s our human nature. And if I can help people achieve that, I will put everything I am into it.