lessons from fast food for managing HCOs

In the October issue of the HBR is an article about how Cheryl Bachelder, CEO of Popeye's, a fast food chicken chain, mostly in the South, has been trying to turn around the organization.

https://hbr.org/2016/10/the-ceo-of-popeyes-on-treating-franchisees-as-the-most-important-customers

I've been talking to my students in my management class about the relationship between hospitals and other healthcare organizations (HCOs) and their clinical staff. What is interesting and relevant for our discussion is how, when the company was failing, the CEO refocused corporate efforts not on the end customers (the people buying the chicken), but on the franchisees that own most of the restaurants. The idea was if she could fix the relationship between the company and its franchisees, the franchisees would fix the customer issues. It's a lot like how a hospital CEO really needs to focus on making the docs happy so that the docs will make the patients happy.

From a talent management perspective, if you are a senior leader, you have to treat your employees as if they were your customers. It's an interesting perspective.