Season 4 - Episode 1 | The Journey from Chef to Business Owner and Coach: Victor Burrill (Vietnam, UK)

In this episode, Dr. Ramesh Ramachandra, Founder of Talent Leadership Crucible and Impact Velocity speaks with Victor Burrill, Chairman and Chief Connecting Officer of the Business Executive Network (BEN) in Vietnam. Victor shares his journey from his early days in the UK as a chef and event manager to becoming a leadership coach and establishing BEN. The conversation focuses on entrepreneurship, leadership, crisis management, and personal growth.

5 Key Insights from this Podcast:

1. The Journey from Chef to CEO

Victor reflects on transitioning from the UK culinary world to becoming a business

owner and leadership coach. He highlights the importance of seizing opportunities,

managing uncertainty, and continuously innovating.

2. Crisis-Ready Leadership

Victor emphasises the need for a "crisis-ready mindset," drawing parallels between

leadership and navigating a storm. Leaders must anticipate challenges and respond

with calm resilience during crises.

3. Family Business and Succession Planning

Victor discusses the dynamics of working with his son in the Business Executive

Network (BEN) and the importance of separating professional roles from personal

relationships. He shares insights into planning for succession in family-run

businesses.

4. Spirituality and Leadership

Victor reflects on how his Christian values have shaped his leadership style,

underscoring the importance of honesty, transparency, and a clear conscience in

both personal and professional spheres.

5. The Simple Life and Balance

Despite leading a busy life, Victor stresses the importance of balance. He focuses

on maintaining health, nurturing relationships, and fostering sustainable business

growth.

Host: Dr. Ramesh Ramachandra - Author, Podcast Host, Founder of Talent Leadership Crucible & Impact Velocity 
Guest Speaker: Victor Burrill - Chairman & Chief Connecting Officer of Business Executive Network  

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Transcript

Thriving In The Age Of Disruption – Season 4

Episode 1: From Chef to CEO: The Culinary Journey of a Kitchen Visionary | Victor Burrill (Vietnam, UK)

Dr. Ramesh  00:15

Victor Burrell is the chairman and chief connecting Officer of business executive network. He's also an executive coach and corporate trainer. He has lived both in the UK as well as in Vietnam, and today, he's going to share about his various experiences. Victor, welcome to the podcast, thriving in the age of disruption. I'm so excited that you made it here in spite of the storms outside, I thought we'll start off by having you introduce yourself.

Victor  00:44

Sure, yes. So I've been in Vietnam nearly 20 years now. My name is Victor bolo. I'm from the UK. I was born in Vietnam 56 years ago, in 1968 and I grew up in the UK. I don't speak Vietnamese. I'm British, but I've lived here for nearly 20 years, and I am an executive coach. I have an MBA, and I run an organization called the business executive network, which I spend most of my time doing. I also do some coaching, and I work with leadership teams, with the topic of developing their leadership skills. Victor,

Dr. Ramesh  01:19

Can you share a little bit more about your journey to Vietnam, because you spent a fair bit of your childhood in the UK. You ran some businesses in the UK too. 

Victor  01:29

Yes, well, I was actually born in Vietnam in 1968 that was the year of the Tet Offensive, which was the height, as some people would regard. It was certainly the year that most American soldiers died, I believe it was over 16,000 died that year. And I was born that year, and my mother, who is Vietnamese, and my father, who's English, took me, first of all, to Australia, where my father worked, and then I moved to England. I grew up in a small village called Ink borough, which is just outside Worcestershire, and I went to school at a little private school called Bowe Bucha school. And then I moved to London to do an apprenticeship with the rue brothers as a chef. And I went into management. And I became manager of a catering company. I opened a catering company, which I sold before coming to Vietnam. Since coming to Vietnam, I was in education for a little while. I completed an MBA. I became a certified coach. I found myself coaching CEOs and general directors, and I formed the business executive network in 2017 and now we have a community of CEOs and general directors and country managers in Vietnam, most of which are in Ho Chi Minh City. We have a small group in Hanoi and a small group in Danang. So that's my journey. The quick one.

Dr. Ramesh  02:51

I would never have guessed that you were a chef at one point.

Victor  02:54

I worked in the kitchen of the Roux Brothers, which at the time were the top chefs in the UK. The International Guide for food is Michelin, and so you have one star, two star and three star. And I worked in the Roux Brothers had two three star restaurants, probably the most renowned chefs in the UK, and I did my apprenticeship with them. But after completing my apprenticeship, I left the kitchen and went into management. But I have a love for food. It's been very useful for me when organizing events just choosing menus. I don't cook that much these days, but I do have a real good passion for good food, and I find with my work now, I eat and visit some of the best hotels and restaurants in Vietnam. So that as part of my work, which is a bit of a challenge with keeping the weight down.

Dr. Ramesh  03:42

It sort of explains why some of the B.E.N events are well curated.

Victor  03:49

When I ran a catering company, I ran events. So in fact, I organize meetings and events. And so as a coach, as a facilitator, as a trainer and as an event organizer, those schools come together, and I understand executives, and we try very hard to put together events that suit them.

Dr. Ramesh  04:12

I started this podcast Thriving In The Age of Disruption, partly because I wanted to explore two themes, and they are around entrepreneurial mindset as well as crisis ready mindset. And I feel that in this VUCA world, these two mindsets are essential. So I want to explore that with you. The way I define entrepreneurial mindset is that one is being resourceful. That means you can identify the problem the right problem. Two is to be able to manage the uncertainty and take risks. And three is to create value, both financial and non financial. When I was listening to you about your journey from being a chef into management, running your own catering business, selling that successfully, then coming out to Vietnam and starting all over again. How did you do that?

Victor  05:03

Well it started when I was a chef, and so I was asked to organize a dinner party or an event. I went okay, and they were telling me what they want, and I would put enormous amounts of effort into providing everything that went into that dinner party. It might be one for 14 or 16 people. The first ones were so so because a lot to pull together, you know, you eat the tablecloths and the flowers and the service and the food, there's a lot of things that come together, even for a small event like that. And some people would say, that's not a small event, and then they got bigger. And so somebody might ask me to organize their wedding. Then I started organizing events that I would drive forward, if that makes sense, I might say, Look, if you give me this sort of budget, I can do something a little bit better. And I started doing more and more events. In the end, I gave up my day job in the kitchen and doing events. I had a passion of just doing the best I possibly could. And in the end, and I don't think about this too often, but the catering company ended up doing very, very large events, I've learned a lot of things throughout my career, and one of them is, if you have a good day, then treat it like a good day. Do not get overly excited. Don't celebrate too much. And if you have a bad day, then go, Okay, I've had a bad day, and I believe having mixed with many successful people now that most successful people do not have great highs and lows. They have good days and they have bad days, and they don't get overly emotional about it. I have reasonably good success because we plan for it. We try to not overbook ourselves and do too much. So that's one of the things I've really learned that hasn't always been the case. I've learned the hard way where we've not had enough resources, whether it's time. Equipment, staff, we've had a bad day, and when we have a bad day, there's unhappy people, normally customers, or you lose money. We put enormous effort. I've always learned to put enormous effort and to keep your feet firmly on the ground.

Dr. Ramesh  07:14

I wanted to just quickly summarize what you've shared with us. And it's interesting that you sort of pivoted from being a chef organizing events and then to becoming an event manager. Although you didn't share too much about it, I suspect that you sort of adapted the same kind of thinking you need as a chef when you're organizing an event, looking at the flowers, looking at the service, looking at the ambience, and it's interesting when you can look at things from that big picture to provide the value that you're promising. The second thing that I took away was you have your good days and you have your bad days, and not to be stuck with one label. Use the good days to celebrate that and to move on to the next level.

Victor  08:04

People rely on me to deliver something. The bad days that we have are much rarer now.

Dr. Ramesh  08:12

Yes, you had mentioned your son, and he's working with you, I would define that as a family business, because at least two people are in the operations of the business from the same family, what works about that and what doesn't work about that?

Victor  08:25

I do work with my son in work. He's has a role. He's actually the membership manager. I can work with friends, I can work with family. I can work with people that I know, and I can distinguish or I can identify that this is a workplace situation and this is a friendship situation. So to me, it's never been an issue. I have heard it said you shouldn't miss business and pleasure. Well, my customers are very good friends of mine.

Dr. Ramesh  08:52

Although you might not define yourself strictly as a family business, the dynamics are there. When you have a father and son relationship, you have a role as the owner and a manager, sometimes conflict as a result of those multiple roles that you play. Now, what is more urgent for most family businesses in their succession planning is this conversation of who's going to take over the company, and so are you grooming Tim for that?

Victor  09:19

I think it takes a while for somebody to learn the ropes, and so we're building a team of very more experienced people, and the organization is getting bigger too. My hope is that all our team members can take on more and Tim as well. He's been with me the longest, as is my son. I joke with people. He's been with me for 25 years, and I joke with people. I'm getting my school fees back. But actually he seems now he may, down the line, want to do something else. At the moment, he's very engaged. He's a very important part of the team, and everyone's a really important part of the team. What I'm a little concerned about with this term family businesses is being a business of which my son and I work together, because our members include some of the biggest companies. In the world. Here in Vietnam, you know, the country managers of multinational companies, I probably want them to think that they're working with a professional organization.

Dr. Ramesh  10:08

I appreciate you bringing that up, because most people don't realize that 80% of the businesses are family owned businesses, right by virtue of the fact that two shareholders own 50% and above. And as a founder, when you start a company, the easiest way to get reliable employees would be to tap on your own inner circle of friends and family. So by virtue of that, it becomes a family business. As the business grows and the children grow and they show an interest in the business, there is an opportunity for succession. So that's the landscape of family businesses. But there's also the challenge of a family business, because often it's been criticized for nepotism and not being transparent, and often it's not professional. Let me move on to the next piece, which is also relevant for today's Bucha world, and that is having a crisis ready mindset. And I describe crisis as any kind of setback, and in a setback, you can flee or fight or freeze the people who successful have developed some kind of resilience around a crisis, given that you've done so many things and have had to deal with all the issues that you talked about in managing events, you probably have a high ability to deal with crisis. What training was it or what practice?

Victor  11:33

I’m going to give you an analogy of what I think a business leader should be, and it's on the front page of our magazine, and the title of that issue was navigating change in uncertain times, and there was a ship on there in the storm. And I see the CEOs as being a captain of a ship, the ship being the organization of the business and the storm being the economic environment. And so we have a responsibility, both a legal and a moral and a professional responsibility, to run our businesses, and most businesses, have to get somewhere. They either deliver a service or a product. They have to deliver shareholder value. As a leader, we have to solve problems, and we have to deliver the result, keeping the customer happy, delivering the product, delivering the service, making sure we got the right manpower. We have issues all the time with all of that. The product is not right, the service is not right. You trying to get it right. You're trying to get it right before it goes to the customer. What I have found, though, as I get a bit older, is I'm more prepared for things that might go wrong, and I anticipate things before they happen. And that's most experienced CEOs that I know are like that, they anticipate turnover and things like that.

Dr. Ramesh  12:44

Do you think it might be Ownership mindset? Were you born that way?

Victor  12:48

Oh, that's interesting. No, I think that, like many young people, I probably had to be disciplined into place. So I think that in any career, the first years are really tough, really tough, but in order to advance, you have to have a mindset that you're going to overcome all those challenges and you do the best you can. I don't know where it comes from, but I think it's to do with responsibility and pride and working under people that don't demand anything less than the best.

Dr. Ramesh  13:21

I want to move to a new topic, and that's about spirituality. Where are you in your spirituality? Okay,

Victor  13:27

Well, there was a time when I was about 2122 Yes, I started reading the Bible, and I became a Christian, and around 2004 maybe even before that, I started to not follow the Bible or be a Christian anymore. But I do have some Christian values, and I believe in being transparent and honest. I think it was really good for me, actually, at that age, to be part of a Christian community where I learned some good values, saw some great relationships. I believe there's a higher being, and I try to live my life with a good conscience. I wouldn't say I follow any religious or spiritual path, but I want to be able to wake up and go to bed each day and know that I've done the best I can for people, and that's the best I can do. And because I think before I became involved with the church, I think I tried to get success by doing things the wrong way, when I said the wrong way, putting people down, being a little dishonest, not being open about weaknesses and things like that. And so I think it put me on the straight and narrow. I think it was pretty good that way. I think now I've made mistakes, of course, but I avoid them now, and I just feel like it's better just to be as honest as possible. 

Dr. Ramesh  14:46

On a related topic, do you think it's possible to live a simple life? And what's a simple life for you?

Victor  14:50

Oh my gosh. I do know some people that have decided to live a simple life live in a little place in the countryside, to not worry too many. I mean, they earn money in different ways, whether it's online or by coaching or by they live a pretty simple life. I'm trying to do less now. As I get a little older, there are some people that I know that are very wrapped up in corporate life. I don't have any strong views on it. I wake up early and I have a full on day, and what I don't complete today will be done tomorrow, and my list is full, and I delegated to other people as much as I can. So I don't live a very simple life. I live a pretty full life. I'm not overwhelmed, and I don't get a bed too stressed, but I have a full on lifestyle. So yeah, nice. I don't socialize so much. I don't go to a lot of parties and events. I tend to save my energy more for what I think are adding value to the business and my customers. So I tend to rest. I relax at the weekends. I don't party a lot. I do enjoy meeting with friends. I do enjoy going out.

Dr. Ramesh  15:54

That's interesting. So you do keep time for yourself to recharge.

Victor  15:59

I like reading. I like listening to podcasts. I like follow certain speakers and writers, and I like to think plenty of thinking time.

Dr. Ramesh  16:10

So if you had to describe thriving, which three words would you use?

Victor  16:15

I think relationships is really important, having people around you that you can go to speak, I think it's growth as in maturity growth, as in learning health business as well. I think that, because I run a business, I want to see a business that thrives. And I think a lot of people sacrifice business for relationships, or relationships for business. Some people sacrifice health because they want more success. I know a lot of executives that are not in good health, overweight, they don't exercise very much, and so I think that getting balanced lifestyle is quite important. Well, I'm watching my weight a little bit. I'm watching what I eat. I'm making slow but steady progress. I think it could be quicker. So I'm not thriving in that area, but I'm making progress, if you understand what I mean.

Dr. Ramesh  17:05

Yeah, yeah. So Victor, what advice do you have for young entrepreneurs?

Victor  17:14

Keep going, keep pursuing your dream. Don't give up, and also be incredibly humble, but I think it's also really important to make sure you get paid fairly for the work that you do. Do not ask for too much, do not ask for too little, and make sure that you are compensated because you need that money to keep your business going, so that those are the sort of things that come to mind, I think also get advice from other people. Do you think this is a good idea? Is this the right route? How would I I've got this situation, the customer decides that they don't want to pay me everything. What should I do? But it depends at what stage they're an entrepreneur, if it's a startup stage where they really don't know what they're doing, or if their business is very young. So most businesses, most entrepreneurs, are trying to get their business somewhere, and that takes a lot of effort. That takes a lot so you've got to really love what you do, and, you know, not give up. So those are a few things I think might be helpful to a young entrepreneur or an old entrepreneur. 

Dr. Ramesh  18:13

Okay, that's right, wherever you are in that journey.

Victor  18:16

There you go. I hope that's helpful.

Dr. Ramesh  18:21

So, Victor, what's your advice for emerging young women leaders?

Victor  18:27

That's very interesting. I'll share with you something I've learned having been the chairman of the business executive network. All our members are, see as general directors. And about, I think, is around 27% of our members are women, and I would like it to be more, and I love to have dynamic women, which we have in our network. It's tough for men and women to be successful. It's tough being a CEO. There's sacrifices that need to be made to be successful at anything. What I said to women is that keep going whatever you want, whatever you desire, is available to you. I think a lot of them, however, step out of their careers for some time for children, and they come back in, and they sometimes fall behind the race. There are men here and women that will sacrifice anything for their careers. And so I think that did tough out there to be at the very, very top. And I admire women that are and the few women that have made it to the top of our network. I believe now there's more opportunity for women than there's ever been, and I would encourage them to take those opportunities if that's what they want, if that's what they want. There are some women that don't want to sacrifice.

Dr. Ramesh  19:42

Wonderful. Thank you. Okay, you know, we've sort of come to the end of the formal part of this podcast, and I wanted to ask some fun facts about you.

Victor  19:52

Okay, oh my gosh. Okay, did you write these down before?

Dr. Ramesh  19:55

No...no... It's spontaneous. So what's your favorite? Book,

Victor  20:01

Because I've read it and taught it quite a few times. I quite like Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. It's just inspiring. I think that a well renowned book for many years.

Dr. Ramesh  20:12

If you could have dinner with anyone in the world, who would it be?

Victor  20:15

Probably somebody like Simon Sinek.

Dr. Ramesh  20:21

What's the best advice that you've ever received?

Victor  20:24

Okay, there was a time when I was a young manager or leader, and I was trying to do my job. Well, I was giving the general manager of the organization a bit of a hard time. I was requiring support resources, and I was complaining I wasn't getting enough of them fast enough. And somebody who was quite high up in the organization invited me to have dinner one night, and just let me know that he knew my intention. He knew that I meant good, but he realized I was going about it the wrong way, and he helped me to understand it from the general director's perspective. Wow, and realize that I'm not the most important person in the organization, and it was a good eye opener for me.

Dr. Ramesh  21:12

Thank you, Victor for being with us here today.

Victor  21:16

Thank you very much. And I hope your listeners find it useful. Thank you very much.