A few weeks ago, it was announced that Chick-fil-A was the top ranked quick service restaurant for the 11th year in a row. This is a remarkable accomplishment as the now international brand has been able to stay atop the leaderboard with such consistency year after year. These specific rankings are not based on important aspects of business like sales, profit, or employee satisfaction. Instead, these scores simply center around customer satisfaction. 

As someone who has worn a Chick-fil-A nametag for the past 14 years, I have gained lots of perspective as to what sets the brand apart. What is CFA doing that’s different from others? While I obviously cannot speak for the company as a whole or on behalf of CFA Inc, here are a few observations from my experience behind the curtain.

Key Drivers of Success

1. Culture: Literally everyone nowadays talks about culture. Is there a bigger buzzword concept in business?! Even still, so many organizations fail to capitalize on the advantage of maintaining a healthy culture. Spend some time around CFA folks, either from restaurant locations or the Corporate Support Center, and you will see the culture shining through. Decades ago, Founder Truett Cathy spent years casting a vision of a company where it would be their pleasure to serve quality food to customers with consistent hospitality. This sort of intentionality around building and maintaining culture continued over the years that followed, and still continues today. While an entire book could be written on this one important topic, suffice it to say that the CFA culture is a clear differentiator. 
   • • Foundations of Culture: Values, mission, and purpose are key building blocks of a positive culture. If these are authentic, actionable, and taken seriously, then they directly impact the actions that employees take day after day. These building blocks are like giant magnets that should help pull the ship along in the correct direction. The CFA Corporate Purpose is “To glorify God and positively influence everyone who comes in contact with Chick-fil-A”. This purpose is big enough to motivate individuals in the company to do good work. It is a purpose that can never be fully achieved, so it will always be an effective motivator. It is other-centric and helps to fight against selfish egos or near-sighted poor decisions. As a company founded on Christian principles, concepts like “Doing to others what you would want them to do to you” and “Going the second mile” in service are key for employees, and it shows.
2. Talent: One of the questions that I get most often is “Where do you get all these sharp employees from?”. Go visit the Corporate Support Center and you won’t believe the level of talent walking around there every day! CFA has continued to attract, grow, and retain high performers across the board. This takes constant effort and a great deal of strategy. With every year that goes by, it becomes harder and harder to get a job in any realm of the company. A team stands a much better chance of winning with 5-star players than with 3-stars, and businesses are no different. It’s also easier to win while functioning with a full roster, as opposed to being understaffed. The one-two punch of culture and talent is dynamic inside of Chick-fil-A.   
3. Long-term view: If key differences between Chick-fil-A and some of the competition were not already becoming clear, they come into focus with even more clarity here. For any organization, a balance must be maintained between winning now and winning long-term. Interestingly, many entities appear to err on the side of short-term wins, often at the expense of health over the long haul. While it’s never easy to play the long, CFA often makes decisions to do exactly this. One example of this is how the company tests potential new menu items over years and years. While it can be tempting to just roll things out and see what sticks, the approach taken is often one of tact and long-term strategy. This happens as the company looks to win for decades, not just months/years.    
4. Sales over profit: I must preface this point by saying that nowhere, to my knowledge, has Chick-fil-A said that this is a strategy of the company. But from my observation, there is an internal understanding of the fact that more money can be made both by maximizing the bottom line AND by growing the top line. Would you rather keep 12% of $1 million or 10% of $1.5 million? Obviously, the answer is 12% of $1.5! But if push comes to shove, the answer is of course the latter option. For some reason, this seems to be a concept that many companies fail to understand. But from an outsider’s perspective, a company like Amazon, for example, appears to be capitalizing on this. Whatever the case may be, CFA keeps looking to grow sales over time while playing the long game.  
5. People and profit: No company in their right mind would ignore profits. The Chick-fil-A model is not one of people > profits. But it functions more like people + profits. This is clear in how they treat employees and customers alike. While there are some bad apples here or there across the company landscape, the vast majority of those employed are kind and caring people who genuinely want the good for others. A model of profit at all costs can lead to all sorts of organizational disease. But a model that requires those inside the company to value others produces very different results. It is clear that by properly prioritizing employees and customers, a business actually ends up still reaping the reward in healthier profits when all is said and done! 
6. Strategic Menu: In an effort to grow sales, some companies throw more and more at the menu board. “I’ll have the #27 please”. But tossing on too many random menu items can bog down store operations and inhibit restaurant ability to serve these items up to the quality and speed standards that customers expect. It can be better to do a few things really well than to attempt too many things and do none of them with excellence. Similar to the Raising Cane’s and Guthrie’s of the world, Chick-fil-A has worked diligently over the years to avoid overcrowding the menu. But providing customers with an array of great (and some healthy) options is a real priority. In a genius move to try and capture the best of both worlds, CFA moved to a model where they do one seasonal item (like the Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken Sandwich) plus one seasonal beverage (like the Dragonfruit Lemonade) per quarter. The cadence is clear and consistent, both for customers and restaurant staff across the globe.   
7. Continuous Improvement: If I had a dollar for each time that a customer said something like “Man I wish y’all could run the government/the Covid testing sites” then I’d certainly have more dollars than I currently have! I’ve always believed that the main thing that customers are alluding to with these statements is the constant Chick-fil-A push to get better. For goodness’ sake, the company even uses drones to film the drive-thru lines and then consult with store leaders on how to shave off a second or two from each transaction. When you stop to think about it, this seems kind’ve crazy! But there continues to be a relentless focus on making the business better. It’s almost like an obsession, and because things can ALWAYS be better, the work is never done. Instead of showing up just to run the same ole play month after month, leaders and employees all across CFA are fanatical about being just a little bit better.

In Closing

When I started writing this I only had 4 points under Key Drivers of Success. The more I wrote, the more things popped into my mind as it pertains to CFA’s now 11 year streak on top of the QSR rankings. While this is just a small snapshot, I believe each and every one of these things are currently true of the brand. This is a great reminder of the importance of an abundance mindset. When a business is run well, everybody wins and everybody can be happy. 

Looking at the organization that you lead or are a part of, how many of these would you say are true? Which of these could (or should) be added in order to raise the level of effectiveness of your organization? What exactly would have to change in order for this to happen?