Wednesday, May 4, 2011

A Taste of Servant Leadership

If you go to Celebration Restaurant expecting excellent food and outstanding service, you will leave happy and satisfied. You will, however, have just experienced the two more visible reasons for the success of Celebration. The back story is that Celebration Restaurant and Market is a servant leadership organization.
There are many examples of how Ed Lowe and his partners have implemented servant leadership in both their professional and personal lives. One that comes to mind now is the story of Celebration’s Farmers’ Market which reopened for the 2011 season on April 30th. This story demonstrates two-way accountability, empowering people to be successful, and making a difference for the people served.
 
Celebration has long supported local farmers by serving their produce in the restaurant. The team began to discuss ways to strengthen this support and hit on the idea of a farmers’ market. Then because of the demands of work, the idea stalled. Finally Leah Ferraro, the manager of the Market, asked Ed about the status of the Farmers’ Market and when he told her he had been too busy to move on it, she asked two questions: l. Why hadn’t he asked for help? and 2. Would it be okay for her to take over the project? Ed gratefully turned it over to her and then supported her all the way.

Leah soon found that the easy part was lining up the vendors to come while the hard part was dealing with the City of Dallas. She kept running up against different stories as to what permits she needed, only to finally learn that the permit she was told to get didn’t actually exist. There were clear regulations for the large Dallas Farmers’ Market but all sorts of contradictory rules for the smaller ones. covering such things as health insurance, vendor fees and number of vendors. Leah eventually partnered up with some of the other smaller community markets to go before the city and change the regulations for these smaller markets. All along the way, she had the support and advice from Ed and her other Celebration partners.

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