S1E5: Kitchen Knives

Show Notes

Summary

Sara and Mathias take a detour from their usual leadership topics to geek out about kitchen knives, and the conversation traces all the way back to how they first bonded over cooking in 2018. Along the way, they swap stories about knife guys, kitchen mishaps involving mandolins and cabbage, and family cooking memories that shaped how each of them approaches food. But underneath the knife talk is a familiar thread from their book: the same care, attention, and intentionality that goes into keeping a knife sharp is what makes someone effective in management and leadership. They connect it to real moments, including planning a round of layoffs down to the smallest detail, to make the case that sweating the small stuff is never really small.

And here's a blog post related to this episode: The Way You Do Anything, Is The Way You Do Everything

Keywords

kitchen knives, sharpening, craft, care, cooking, leadership, management, attention to detail, tools, intentionality

Takeaways

• Good tools require ongoing care, not just a one-time purchase — sharp knives need regular sharpening, honing, and proper storage to stay useful.

• The care people bring to small, mundane tasks (like maintaining a knife) tends to mirror the care they bring to bigger responsibilities, including leadership.

• Sara and Mathias's shared knife obsession traces back to their first cooking session together in 2018, when Mathias struggled to find a sharp knife in Sara's kitchen.

• That experience led Sara to a regular knife sharpener (Gary, found through a sign at Whole Foods) who she still uses today.

• Sharp knives are actually safer than dull ones, since dull blades require more force and lead to more slips — something both hosts learned the hard way through separate kitchen accidents.

• Choosing "the right tool for the job" in the kitchen parallels choosing the right management approach for a specific team or situation, rather than applying a generic playbook everywhere.

• Both hosts describe building their knife collections intentionally over time, adding tools as real needs emerged — similar to how they each developed their management skills gradually, through experience rather than all at once.

• Attention to small details compounds: the same discipline that keeps a knife sharp also shows up in things like thorough, minute-by-minute planning for a difficult process such as layoffs.

• Appreciating craftsmanship, whether in a hand-forged knife or in the practice of management itself, comes from ongoing care and reflection, not a single skill you acquire and then stop developing.

• Family food memories and traditions (including inherited kitchen knives) show how personal, formative experiences with cooking can shape how someone approaches care and craft later in life.

Chapters

00:00 The Art of Caring for Tools

02:55 Management Through Attention to Detail

03:36 The Unconventional Start: Knives in the Kitchen

04:31 Bonding Over Cooking: A Shared Experience

06:30 The Quest for Sharp Knives: A Culinary Journey

07:13 Territoriality in the Kitchen: A Personal Reflection

09:00 Cooking as a Communal Activity: The Joy of Feeding

10:42 Breaking Out of the Cooking Rut: Seeking Inspiration

13:00 Family Traditions: Cooking Memories and Inherited Knives

14:55 The Importance of Sharp Knives: Safety and Efficiency

17:07 Kitchen Accidents: Learning from Mistakes

18:32 The Catalyst of Sharp Knives: A Leadership Analogy

19:44 Cutting Boards: The Unsung Heroes

19:59 Sweating the Small Stuff: Attention to Detail

22:31 The Right Tool for the Job: Management Metaphors

25:31 Navigating Change: The Sharp Knife Approach

27:53 Craftsmanship in Leadership: Caring for Your Tools

30:13 The Journey of Learning: From Novice to Expert

Transcript

Mathias Meyer (00:02) We're known to obsess about a few things, much to the chagrin of our respective partners. Bags, pens and pencils, notebooks, books in general. And then there's cooking, which doesn't require a lot of tools to get started with, but to do it well, you need good knives. Good meaning that they're comfortable to handle and that they are and stay sharp. Good knives also require care.

You need to worry about how to best store them so they don't get dull or dented. You need to keep them sharp. You need to keep them clean, especially the carbon steel kind, my personal favorite. Knives may seem like such a mundane thing to care about, but there's something deeper about the admiration we have for a really good knife. We care for our tools. We care for how we go about things.

We care about the little details, like using the right knife, for what we need to slice. That care, that attention to detail, to sweating the small stuff, translates into the work of management. It's the thread throughout our book. Good tools and a thoughtful, dare I say intentional approach to them helps you consider more than just the immediate problem to solve. You look for solutions that last.

You build frameworks that you can reapply again and again should a similar situation emerge. You consider what the people in the organization, in your team would want and the questions they'd ask. You look at a problem and the solution from many angles, gathering as many perspectives as possible and as reasonable. That's our style of management. It's the one we're teaching our clients.

But just like with knives, that style evolved through experience. It's only through constant reflection that we manage to home in on what the right approach for our specific team and the problem at hand was. I personally love talking to folks who care who themselves care about knives. Sara and I both have knife guys. Folks we know do a great job giving dull knives a new edge.

And we care about the craft of making them. I could talk to my knife guy for hours. It is no coincidence that on our recent trip to Montreal that we did together, Sara and I visited a Japanese knife shop to buy partnership knives. We like getting something that's unique for our for every time we get together, which usually doesn't happen more than once a year. So whenever I use the knives I got.

A Japanese cleaver and a Santoku knife, I can think of the time we were in that shop, slicing carrots with different knives, not really knowing what to look for in the knives we were looking at. But eventually we each had knives in our hands where we just felt that they're the one. Also, at this point, it shouldn't surprise you at all that I brought a knife with me on that trip from Germany to make sure we've got a sharp knife to cook with.

because we do love cooking. Today you get to listen to us geek out about one of the topics we love talking about so much. Sharp knives.

Mathias Meyer (03:42) Well hello,

we're going to switch it up a little bit and we were giving ourselves permission to talk about something that is not necessarily or immediately related or relatable to management and the leadership in those kinds of things. But who knows where we're going to take it. And so today we're going to be

Sara Hicks (03:50) you

Mathias Meyer (04:03) talking about knives and kitchen knives specifically. Like just, would it be clear? Like this is not about like everyday carry knives or things like that, or, you know, making a hobby of collecting hunting knives, stuff like that. No, the really truly practical kind that you, or at least that we use every single day, multiple times a day even. And it's a weird and fun thing that developed between us.

Sara Hicks (04:13) you you

Mathias Meyer (04:31) And that is also like a tiny arc in our book, And funnily enough, the story about knives and, you know, the two of us always goes back to the very beginnings of when we met. And this was in 2018.

Sara Hicks (04:41) Okay.

Mathias Meyer (04:48) It was a lovely September in LA when I was visiting. And a thing bonded over early on was cooking food and cooking as a communal activity. And I offered to cook, It must have been a risotto? Probably. think that would...

Sara Hicks (05:08) I think it was risotto,

yeah.

Mathias Meyer (05:10) Well, I was in your kitchen and I actually was curious how you experienced this story before maybe sharing mine. From my perspective, I'm just curious. This German.

complaining in your kitchen.

Sara Hicks (05:26) I just had

a couple thoughts. One is the 2018 version of you, was

like help in the kitchen. So

Mathias Meyer (05:37) Mmm, true.

Sara Hicks (05:39) when you were in the kitchen, it was like, just stay out of the way, really.

Mathias Meyer (05:43) Hmm.

Sara Hicks (05:44) And then I can't, I think you were looking for, you know, you're looking through drawers and things and trying to find what you needed. And think it was a version of like, this is garbage. Like all of a sudden you were trying every single knife and you couldn't find one that was sharp. Everything was dull. And I started to feel slightly mortified.

mean, this is, still pretty new in our friendship too and working together. So it was like, uh-oh. humiliation. Thankfully you did find a knife that was suitable, that was still,

Mathias Meyer (06:19) I did find a knife, yeah.

Sara Hicks (06:21) it was sharp, but majority were, hadn't been tended to in a while.

where, you know, we had just moved into that house pretty recently. It was a rough year.

but no excuses. It's knives and knives should be sharp. Um, so then was it that same trip that we just happened to be?

doing some grocery shopping over at Whole Foods and there was a sign outside of Whole Foods said knife sharpening like.

Mathias Meyer (06:46) Yeah, it was,

it was that same trip. Like I complained and I was still already brought the solution.

Sara Hicks (06:55) It's true. It's Whole Foods had

weekly knife sharpening service,

Gary. Gary

Mathias Meyer (07:01) Gary.

Sara Hicks (07:01) who does knife sharpening and now is my knife sharpener. Yes.

I just call him directly now. I just go direct to the source.

Mathias Meyer (07:11) you have Gary's number. Wow.

it is interesting to hear this story from your side every now and because, yes, I maybe must have given an odd first impression being in the kitchen.

You know as Germans we may be you know as a people we might be more forthcoming in the things we don't like And maybe that is

Sara Hicks (07:34) You

Mathias Meyer (07:36) or at least at that time was more pronounced in me as well

Sara Hicks (07:42) also did have some opinions, I will say, about how many measuring cups and measuring spoons. I have a whole drawer.

Mathias Meyer (07:49) True.

you you do you.

It's fine. I think it's all fine. I will also say for the record and Maybe you can confirm this maybe not I've tried to open up my cooking to involve other people but I will fully admit

have been very Let's say territorial in the kitchen when it comes to cooking and haven't really liked

having help. There's a whole other story in there about delegating and what that means. I want to say I've tried, but also I still enjoy being in the kitchen all by myself. I do appreciate the solitude that I get. I oftentimes cook on my own, but also, you know, maybe that's also a behavior.

Sara Hicks (08:21) Okay.

Mathias Meyer (08:40) or an expectation that I have conditioned in the family rather than explicitly set expectations. It's just something that people have gotten used to and I've gotten used to it, and so it just keeps reinforcing itself. But maybe overall, and maybe that's also how we bonded, was like cooking is a...

Sara Hicks (08:45) you you

Mathias Meyer (09:00) even if you do it yourself and you serve food to other people, there's still something very communal about the activity, right? and I mean, at least for me, there's a joy of feeding other people. And

Sara Hicks (09:15) Yeah.

Mathias Meyer (09:17) Even early years of being a founder, this was before we met, was... coming home at a reasonable time and cooking was just like... there was an instant disconnect. There was an instant moment of leaving something behind.

Sara Hicks (09:32) Yep.

Yeah, I think I have

the same view on that, it's like what's so satisfying about cooking a meal is that you plan it, you do the shopping, you cook it, you have the payoff, you get the meal, and it's it's this project that happens in a short period of time and you have this nice meal.

And in our work as founders and executives, you know, our work spans often weeks, months, years, and the projects are often quite long. And so it just was a nice disconnect to come home and have this thing and like just mental switch, creative switch, and

have a meal at the end.

Mathias Meyer (10:21) Yeah, yeah, it's a very short-term thing in some ways, right? Like it's, even though there is this whole process of shopping, and then, you know, doing your mise en place, and, the activity of cooking,

It's still very satisfying.

Sara Hicks (10:38) Yeah, I was just we're having a friend over Saturday

night for dinner and I was just got a couple cookbooks off the shelf because I was like Looking for some inspiration just something different and we also haven't just also gotten a rut haven't been hosting having friends over

Mathias Meyer (10:57) Hmm.

Sara Hicks (10:58) as much so

Tis the season here. We're recording this a week before US Thanksgiving. We're going into the holidays, so I suspect we will be hosting some more dinners, which will be nice. Get me out of the rut.

Mathias Meyer (11:12) Give me a hug. Give me a hug

for breakfast. Yeah. I mean, again, it's that social part. Ah, which is also nice. Sometimes when I serve a larger group of people, like, I get so engrossed in the kitchen and serving the food that there's not always... time for me.

to really rest or even enjoy the food but somehow I still enjoy that. It is quite odd. It is nice to look around a table and stuffed faces that are satisfied with the food that was put on the table. For Christmas we might have,

Sara Hicks (11:32) Okay.

Mathias Meyer (11:53) eight of us or even ten.

Sara Hicks (11:55) Well.

Mathias Meyer (11:56) And just in Germany the Christmas holidays are usually when the feeding frenzy happens as we don't have a Thanksgiving. Thankfully I don't have to play Santa this year for our neighbors. That was always a bit of a distraction because it always happened just before dinner.

Sara Hicks (12:04) Yeah.

Mathias Meyer (12:14) The interesting thing is always to have my mother over specifically because I mean and I say this in the sweetest way possible, also somewhat territorial in the kitchen. And just spend

Sara Hicks (12:23) .

Mathias Meyer (12:26) even like for as long as I've known even though she was a teacher when she was working, spend like a ton of time in the kitchen.

didn't always agree with what she was cooking and I think my cooking is, I would like to say, very different. But I also, you know, this is one of those moments in times where it's reflected back to me that there is a part where I'm very similar to my mother, even though

Sara Hicks (12:50) Okay.

Mathias Meyer (12:56) I try not to be. How was this with your parents and family?

Sara Hicks (13:00) Yeah,

my mom was main in the house cooking. I'm the youngest of four kids, so there of us around the table. You know, so many memories sitting on the kitchen counter watching mom cook. And then when I got to a certain age,

I got to help and that was like, think my introduction to cooking and just, you know, whether it was helping her with some of the prep or the cleanup or we'd make something special together, usually a dessert or cookies or something. But yes, mom was, stay at home mom with four kids, dad would come home, lots of memories of

dinners together as a family. It was always really fun when it was taco night, like those are like taco night or spaghetti night or just like so great. definitely nights where didn't want to eat, of course. Also did a lot of grilling, barbecuing, grilling.

Yeah, a lot of great memories there. And we were talking about, I inherited some of my parents' kitchen passed down, still in my knife drawer today. I don't even know who makes them. I was just looking before we hopped on. was like, I think they're German made.

Mathias Meyer (14:15) Mm-hmm.

Sara Hicks (14:16) My bread knife, serrated bread knife and

and I'm just a simple vegetable knife, from my parents.

Mathias Meyer (14:26) That's nice. Yeah, I've been at this stage where I've given my parents new knives. I gave my mom two new knives last year for her birthday because like, I think it's sometime in maybe May or June, we were in the middle of asparagus season, which is just around there in Germany, specifically white asparagus. And I was doing a hollandaise sauce. And for that, you need to cut

Sara Hicks (14:39) You

Mathias Meyer (14:55) you know, some shallots really finely and then I used her knives and it was so much worse than in your kitchen It was really painful. Yes. It was like, I

Sara Hicks (15:04) It sounds painful. It sounds painful.

Mathias Meyer (15:09) just... I didn't understand how you cut anything rather than just press it down really firmly.

It was very frustrating and so I looked at these knives and they were very cheap, very old, and I was like, okay, I know what I'm getting her for her birthday. And of course then when she got them, she cut herself quite a bit because they were just, she wasn't used to them being so sharp.

Sara Hicks (15:25) Okay.

I read that, or maybe, did we talk about this? Like that sharp knives are actually safer for you than dull knives. And the reason being is like

Mathias Meyer (15:43) We've probably talked about it.

Sara Hicks (15:45) when it's a dull knife, you have to push harder, right? Like you have

Mathias Meyer (15:47) Yeah.

Sara Hicks (15:48) to, and the hard.

pushes, kind of leads to more slips and accidents versus a razor sharp knife being just smoother. But I guess if you're not used to it, yes, the switch from a dull to a sharp knife could be pretty jarring We both have had kitchen accidents. Mine was with

Mathias Meyer (16:09) This is true.

Sara Hicks (16:10) a mandolin.

Mathias Meyer (16:11) I mean, those things are just dangerous. Like this,

Sara Hicks (16:14) Very dangerous. Now there's a rule

in my house where you can't use that without the safety glove and without the little attachment. Like I just, I I have the safety.

Mathias Meyer (16:21) You have a safety glove. I've been using a mandolin

twice maybe last week and I kept thinking back to this and always use the thing where you put stuff in. Yeah,

I think it was the same thumb even that we had like the...

Sara Hicks (16:35) Yeah, yeah, it's still it's

still it's only about 80 % back to normal.

Mathias Meyer (16:40) Oh no, was the

right one for you, right? Like, oh yeah, was the left one for me. And for me it was actually... It was a sharp knife. Like, it was my favorite knife and it is super sharp. But,

Sara Hicks (16:52) Mm.

Mathias Meyer (16:53) I was cutting pretty sure it was either kale or chard. So something that, you know, is harder to cut where you're more tempted to, you know, slam the knife down. Uh, yeah. But it's

still...

Sara Hicks (17:07) I was cutting,

I was cutting green cabbage.

Mathias Meyer (17:11) there you go. Yeah, that'll also do it. think, and the usual where a sharp knife helps is when you, most things you slice more and it's easier and nicer to just pull the knife over the board and, rather than push it down. but it was.

Sara Hicks (17:27) Ridiculous, yeah.

Mathias Meyer (17:27) I mean it was a very clean cut just like it probably was for you. The mandolin is ridiculously sharp. I

have no regrets there about a sharp knife.

And you now have Gary. And I of course also have my knife guy here. And thankfully I have a knife sharpener just

Sara Hicks (17:46) What is your knife guy's name?

Mathias Meyer (17:47) I don't know what his first name is because that's not a thing here in Germany.

Sara Hicks (17:51) Okay.

Mathias Meyer (17:52) But I do like even chatting with him. Like I've bought a couple of knives there. I bought the knives from my mother. They even have a knife showroom around the corner. Where it was

Sara Hicks (18:02) wow

Mathias Meyer (18:03) there and it is... It's almost like a knife studio where you have just the display of knives and it's a nice big work surface in the middle where you can try out the knives. But I also just gave... I went through all of our kitchen knives here.

and gave them a proper resharp- resharpening so that they are, they're ready. They're ready for the holidays.

But yeah,

since

that story in 2018, presumably, you've been to Gary more than once and have enjoyed sharp knives ever since. And probably now, whenever I come over, is that fear still there? Is that still present?

Sara Hicks (18:38) Yes. is true. Yeah. Yes. for sure.

the week before you arrive, we sharpen the knives.

yeah, sometimes it's just doing it at home.

But yes, it's still, it's still a stress that you bring when you come to Los Angeles.

We have to make sure, and it is, think, one of the first things you do when you arrive in the home is you check the knife drawer, I think.

Mathias Meyer (19:11) I like to look at myself there also as a catalyst in some ways, right? my presence ensures that the knives are sharp.

Sara Hicks (19:21) maybe this is the good transition of how we can talk about sharp knives as it relates to leadership and management and

Mathias Meyer (19:29) Mm-hmm.

Sara Hicks (19:29) our approach to leadership and management.

one of the pieces of feedback testimonials we got from our book was, you know, it's sweating the small stuff. And

this may all sound like small stuff, like,

It is. Keeping your knives sharp, But very much important to focus on the small details because all these small details add up in the kitchen and in companies, right?

Mathias Meyer (19:59) Yeah.

there's a whole thing there where, it is useful to think about like, what is the right tool for this particular job? Right. that is true in the kitchen. And that is also true when you're in a company in your management or leadership role, where you don't just come in and apply. Well,

Sara Hicks (20:18) you

Mathias Meyer (20:19) just something very generic or something you've applied everywhere else, but rather think about like, how would this land here? What does this company or what does this team need? What concerns might they have? What hurdles might I need to overcome? And how could I address that? Where it fosters the kind of thinking where you

Sara Hicks (20:23) you

Mathias Meyer (20:43) look at these details rather than drop in a...

just the universal framework of management that

Sara Hicks (20:50) Right.

Mathias Meyer (20:52) you drop in everywhere. Just really think about metaphorical sense, which is the right knife to deal with a specific situation or then what's the right approach to think about a specific situation. And is your approach, so to say, sharp enough?

Sara Hicks (21:10) Good.

Mathias Meyer (21:11) for the job you have at hand, right? Think about like cutting sushi, Fish for sushi. It's like one of those art forms where you practice it. Like if you want to be a master of sushi, you practice it for like eternities and somehow

Sara Hicks (21:26) Yeah.

Mathias Meyer (21:29) in management and leadership, there tends to be oftentimes, and I want to, you know...

throw everybody or ourselves in one pot, there's a

Sara Hicks (21:38) Yeah.

Mathias Meyer (21:40) tendency to drop something in and just leave it at that, right? You drop something and you never look at it again. You hope it works. You assume it works. You assume everybody gets it. And then you're frustrated that that is not the case.

Sara Hicks (21:43) Yep.

Right

it's that paying attention, making sure, right tool for the right job. Paying attention when things are dull, when something's not working.

Mathias Meyer (22:11) Things are dull. That's excellent. Excellent metaphor. Yeah. It does work in

the team and in an organization.

Sara Hicks (22:19) And then pausing, right? Pausing to sharpen, pausing to listen, pausing just to pay attention when something's not working, especially when you're introducing something that's new or different or a change.

Mathias Meyer (22:31) Yeah. But again, like there is also this thing of, you know, having a drawer full of, of knives and there are too many of them. Right. I think that can also

Sara Hicks (22:40) Yes.

Mathias Meyer (22:40) work in that's what I, how I added knives to my repertoire. Like I added a knife when I saw a need, right? When I saw something, something in the kitchen emerged that I haven't done before, like making sushi as one example.

where the knives that I had excuse the pun just didn't cut it right

Sara Hicks (23:00) Ha.

Mathias Meyer (23:02) or they didn't have you know the right dough the the right form or shape to do the job really well and there is you know again we come back to and sweating the small stuff where and it's not just an arsenal

Sara Hicks (23:09) Right. Okay.

Mathias Meyer (23:18) of knives where you just grab one and hope it works but even adding to that drawer

to me has been, least over recent years, an intentional process. Like I started out with just normal chef's knife. It was a German one, but it's still a very somewhat generic knife. And it's similar way. I started out my management career with a very generic and abstract

of how it could be without really having any way or any knowledge of translating this into the actual management work. And that's why it just took years to, just like it takes years to build up a nice set of knives, to build up the right tools you can bring into a team without overburdening them, without it being too dull, or without cutting fingers.

Sara Hicks (23:56) Okay.

Mathias Meyer (24:14) And it requires a care, right? Just like caring for your knife, caring for the tools that you use. think that's, that just translates incredibly well. So I'm always, I'm always thrilled and chuckling to myself that this is a story arc that's been a part of us, like since the very beginning. And

Sara Hicks (24:27) Yep. So very beginning,

very first, very first.

Meal together, you know, home cooked meal together, yeah.

Mathias Meyer (24:43) It's caused pain, but also it maybe created a different level of appreciation for something, I don't know. It did make it into the book,

Sara Hicks (24:50) I mean, it made it into the book. So there's that. It made it into

Mathias Meyer (24:54) I keep thinking about one analogy in leadership that just recently came back into a coaching conversation was about handling large changes in an organization.

I think we covered part of this in our episode on difficult conversations. And maybe also talking about But there's even in this process, like there is no one knife, there's no one approach that you could use, no one tool to go through this process of managing and communicating.

controlling whatever a large change or shift in an organization, right? Whether that is a contracting change or whether it's a big shift in direction, where you really need to pay attention to the smallest of details, where you need to most cut something really big into the smallest pieces that you can and look at every single piece individually. And where you really have to

Sara Hicks (25:37) Okay. you

Mathias Meyer (25:59) of again to use this beautiful metaphor a sharp knife like through this entire process even as you're planning it as you're executing the process and then whatever happens afterwards right this that's the kind of stuff i keep thinking about

Sara Hicks (26:15) Yeah, so important. When you think about, I mean, I was just thinking about one time in particular where we were in the unfortunate situation where we had to do some layoffs. We had to let some folks go from our team and such a painful

experience for everyone, certainly for the folks we had to let go, one thing, you know, talk about sweating the small stuff. When we were planning for that and preparing for that, it just, we had a, I remember a spreadsheet down to the minute

Mathias Meyer (26:46) Huh.

Sara Hicks (26:47) planned out for how we were going to communicate across the company to these individuals and all the

pre-planning and just conversations we needed to have and preparation and paperwork And I think it, it's critical. It's important to pay attention to really figure out

what tools are needed at what stages and what steps and what people and you have to do it with, that aligns with how you want to build your culture and build your teams. Yeah.

Mathias Meyer (27:16) Yeah,

I think there's also something in there where, you know, the keeping knives sharp and looking after them, oiling your cutting boards.

Not just because it makes them look good, but also because it helps keep the water out of the wood. There's something there where think the that care and also appreciation of craft. Even just thinking about how a knife is made or like I bought a knife off someone once at a market

Sara Hicks (27:30) Yeah. Yes.

Mathias Meyer (27:45) in the south of France and he made those knives and they were Damascus steel.

So this nice folded steel that is then dipped in an acid bath so you can see the

Sara Hicks (27:57) You

Mathias Meyer (27:59) wiggly lines on it. And it was fun to buy it from the guy who actually made it. And I appreciate that. Even preparing for this, I've looked into, surely there must be someone in or around Berlin who offers workshops to make your own knife, which is a whole rabbit hole I got into.

But there's something about this level of care, appreciating your craftsmanship, that I think

Sara Hicks (28:25) Yep.

Mathias Meyer (28:32) people should do more of in management and leadership, right? Looking at management and leadership a process of building up a set of skills, a set of tools, a set of processes over time.

and that they still need honing. You can't even take for granted that one approach that you have works in every single team. But, you know, there's

Sara Hicks (28:48) Okay. Okay.

Mathias Meyer (28:57) a constant loop of feedback, of trying something out, caring for it, crafting it the right way, and then seeing is that the right thing to do here. And I, yeah, maybe it's stretched a little bit far.

But I mean, it's just that care and just appreciating the work itself, which is, I've found, yeah.

Sara Hicks (29:22) I don't think it's too far. Yeah, I don't think it's too

far. I think care is.

It's such a good word here, just appreciating the craft and the care around being a leader and being a manager and taking the time to

learn it and study it and improve and sharpen. mean all these metaphors. I think it's we take for granted, this was my experience. I got promoted into a management role and I had no idea what

Mathias Meyer (29:49) Mm.

Sara Hicks (29:49) it what it meant. or how to do it or until I really

started talking with other managers that I admired and started reading books and talking with others. And I really figure out what it meant for me to be a manager and started to really care about how I showed up as a leader and how I showed up as a manager. And gosh, it took me so

Mathias Meyer (30:11) Hmm.

Sara Hicks (30:11) long. I think that it's an important thing

that folks really look at appreciating the craft and care that it's required to be a leader, to be a manager. It's a big responsibility.

Mathias Meyer (30:23) Yeah,

agreed. And that's why I took that feedback that I don't, you know, do well in the kitchen and delegating. I did take that seriously over the years, but

Sara Hicks (30:36) Yeah, you've gotten better.

Mathias Meyer (30:37) probably not there yet. I I think this last time I was there, I think, I want to say it worked better, but maybe I'm just, you know, tooting my own horn.

Sara Hicks (30:47) No, it did. I remember

last time you were here, we made ratatouille and I helped with lot of the mise en place with the prep work. So there you have it.

Mathias Meyer (31:00) Okay.

Sara Hicks (31:01) Probably time to wrap up

Mathias Meyer (31:02) On that note, to wrap up, what's a fun thing that you've been doing lately

Sara Hicks (31:08) Hmm.

I mean, you know, I love just going to the beach. This week met my childhood friend who I've known pretty much my whole life. She's got a puppy about the same age as our dog. it was just a glorious day on the beach.

Dogs were happy, sunshine, everything was clear, the air was clear. So yeah, that's fun for me, is just getting out to the ocean and seeing the beach.

Mathias Meyer (31:38) So one thing we're missing in Berlin is a beach

Yeah, for me, I am today wearing the shirt from the second band we saw as a family in London, in Haler a band from Ireland.

We saw them at the Royal Albert Hall, and it was beautiful like It was a lovely concert. think speaking of cooking and knives like a book I recently picked up is the anatomy of a Japanese knife speaking of like history and visiting

Sara Hicks (32:06) Nice .

Mathias Meyer (32:10) the traditional forages, like this is exactly what they do here, talk about the different Japanese knife shapes and forms and how they're made.

Well, on that note, we're gonna wrap this up.

And

Sara Hicks (32:22) Yes. We're wrapping up.

Mathias Meyer (32:25) we'll see you in the next episode,

Sara Hicks (32:29) Toodles.

Mathias Meyer (32:30) See you then.