Blank Street’s first employee on the drink he almost rejected — and three practical leadership lessons

The useful part

Here are 3 things I learned helping build the coffee chain to over 100 locations. Follow Jai Lott said he doesn't want to work with people he couldn't spend 12 hours a day, five days a week with. Jai Lott, 41, began working in the coffee industry as a teenager in Australia before moving to the US and joining the coffee chain Bluestone Lane.

How it works

• It didn't fit within the framework of how we were creating drinks at the time.
• Blueberry matcha was so simple that I would have probably been like, "That's not for us." Yet it really changed the baseline of how we do things.
• Six months after we launched it, I was like, "I have to readjust my entire framework for development." Blueberry matcha changed the entire company.
• When you're building a business, you spend more time with the people at work than with your family.
• If I'm going to be building something with someone, it really has to be someone that I would professionally work with, but also outside the office, we would be friends.

What to take from it

That was a really big learning moment for me: to really pay attention to everyone else's ideas on the innovation side. After recently leaving Blank Street to move back to Australia, Lott reflected on some of the things he learned while helping grow the coffee chain, which now has more than 100 locations globally. The good moves, they 100x the bad ones, and the bad ones were always learning points.

Example or evidence

• We had little in common, but there was all this sort of open-minded policy on all things.
• Then it launched, and I think that if I had been there, I would not have launched it.
• I was going so deep on innovation, trying to come up with new things no one had ever done.
• Blank Street is now 50% a matcha business, and our customers are expecting this sort of innovation every few months.

Details worth keeping

Leadership Lessons From Blank Street's First Employee. Business Insider Careers I was Blank Street's first employee. As told to Tim Paradis You're currently following this author!

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