The Hotdog Effect: Secrets of the World’s #1 Restaurants - Will Guidara - #1076

**Chris Williamson** (0:00)
I started listening to emo music when I was 12 and 13, like everybody else, except I never grew out of it. So I'm permanently in band t-shirts that 14-year-old me would think are sick. And that's it.

**Will Guidara** (0:16)
Isn't that like one of the greatest forms of success? If 14-year-old you would be proud of you now?

**Chris Williamson** (0:24)
14-year-old you thinks that you're cool.

**Will Guidara** (0:26)
Yeah. 14-year-old you is saying, gosh, he's like, he's done something with himself, but he's still wearing the bare-toothed t-shirt.

**Chris Williamson** (0:33)
Yeah. What do you think 14-year-old you would say about you?

**Will Guidara** (0:37)
I think 14-year-old me would be pretty psyched. I mean, man, when I was 12, I wanted to be in restaurants. It's literally the only thing I ever wanted to do when I was a kid. And so for 14-year-old me to see that I did that at the absolute highest level, and then somehow managed to find another life to carve out for myself afterwards, I think you'd be pretty impressed.

**Chris Williamson** (1:08)
What a cool concept of what would 14-year-old you think about adult you, as basically the ultimate gauge of whether or not your life's gone or not. What do the people in your industry think of you? Not even actually what your parents think of you, but what would 14-year-old you think of you?

**Will Guidara** (1:25)
Or your spouse, or your friends, or all of those things are important.
I think it's important to show up for the people that you care about and try to make sure that they're excited to have you in their lives. I mean, to this day, I want to make my dad proud based on the relationship I have with him. But honestly, until I made the joke about your bare-toothed T-shirt, I'm not sure. I've actually gone down this road before, which is...

**Chris Williamson** (1:55)
Me neither.

**Will Guidara** (1:56)
I mean, 14-year-old me, his opinion of me is as important as anyone's opinion of me.

**Chris Williamson** (2:04)
Hey, with AI, you might be able to cement a 14-year-old version of you that you could just check in with as a performance coach every so often.

**Will Guidara** (2:13)
Have a little hologram of him over there.

**Chris Williamson** (2:16)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

**Will Guidara** (2:17)
Will, what do you think? Was that a good... Was that good?

**Chris Williamson** (2:20)
Yeah, yeah.
I know exactly what you mean. That trajectory that we all end up on and the way that we get captured by the opinions of people, who in many ways we should. I think there's kind of two categories of people with this. There's one who don't serve others enough, sort of don't care enough about the way that they're contributing to those around them, the opinions of people, they're the egotists, they're the narcissists, they're the obsessives that don't take outside input. But then there's another group of people who care way too much about what other people think. And I get the sense that a lot of people that rise to the top of their careers are actually in the latter camp rather than the former. That they're trying to please, they're trying to, if only I can make myself enough, then the world will see. And is this okay? Am I okay? Are they, do these people, do I look okay to them? And are they responding to me in the way that I want?

**Will Guidara** (3:18)
And also when you start to achieve some level of success, am I continuing to earn it? Is this, am I doing everything I need to do to make sure that people aren't second guessing whether I was meant to be where I now am? Like all that stuff.

**Chris Williamson** (3:33)
Gold medalist syndrome.

**Will Guidara** (3:34)
Do you know what's interesting? You were talking about 14 year old me versus now me. I was on the Zoom with some friends who have a company and they're going through this inflection point where they started up about six years ago and now they're starting to gain some real traction. They're growing. And one of the things they said to me is it's time, we need to grow up. And I stopped them. I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa. I was like, can I offer a different perspective on that? And they're like, yeah, go ahead. I said, I don't think you should ever grow up. I just think you all need to learn how to act like an adult when you need to. And as we're time a 14 year old me versus now me, I'd like to think that if that me was impressed with me now, it's that I don't think I've actually ever fully grown up. I've just gotten good at learning when I need to be an adult in a room.