We recently connected with Josey Dunbar and have shared our conversation below.

Josey, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today The more we talk about good leadership the more we think good leadership practices will spread and so we’d love for you to tell us a story about the best boss you’ve had and what they were like or what they did that was so great?

There is a degree to which I am fortunate as a business owner to not have an authority figure hovering above me, and yet at the same time I have such a responsibility to my team that I often times feel more pressure to preform perfectly than I did being a subordinate.

There are two bosses and one establishment I constantly find myself drawing upon for guidance in leadership. The first is a boss I had at the pool where I worked during the summertime while I was the high school. The second was my long-time boss at a coffee shop in McLean Virginia and the last is an establishment where I worked during college in Malibu California.

The former was an extremely sweet man who was very gifted in his ability to connect with people. Through his leadership I learned how important it is to enjoy your workplace. I have tried to embody his dedication to hosting team dinners, being an approachable boss and hiring people with a passion for people. The second was a boss I had on and off for five years. Through her leadership I learned how to set high standards for my team and also for myself. She came into her own fully staffed cafe everyday ready to work quickly and efficiently. She emphasized the importance of thinking on your feet and problem solving — both of which are do-or-die in the food service industry. The last was an establishment where I worked for a summer during college. I worked for the Malibu location of this coffee shop and was constantly impressed by the skill and thought put into every aspect of the business. From their branding to their training manual, every detail was logical and intelligently chosen. I’m a long way from having a business as put together as theirs was/is but I will forever draw on their model for inspiration.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

Our business is centered around the idea that “Holistic Health Heals”. It was through my own exploration of various health trends and observations of my body’s reaction to different foods, that I came up with this holistic approach to wellness.

When I was eighteen I became a vegetarian and noticed the way it effected my body in both positive ways and negative ways. Taking meat out of my diet and adding in its place more fruits, vegetables and grains that better served my needs made me realize first-hand, that we have the power to affect how we feel based upon what we eat. Over the years I subconsciously created an ever-changing list of foods that made me feel better and worse. Foods that complimented one another and foods that didn’t.

At nineteen I moved to Southern California for college where I learned of–and more often then not participated in–many a health trend. Some worked for me and others didn’t but I learned from all of them. One of the most valuable lessons I learned, however, is the danger of diet-culture. I was fortune to have friends that were nutritionist, food scientists and yoga instructors. Friends who taught me that the colloquial pairing of “health” with “wellness” is by no means accidental.

Health is a holistic thing and to live a healthy life comes down to what you eat but also your relationship with yourself. There is a dangerous culture out there centered around calorie counting and trying to falsely correlate eating less with eating better. Our model is intended to be an antidote to this way of perceiving “healthy living”. At Josey’s, we’ve created meals high in nutrients and always derived from whole foods. Our menu is intended to nourish the body with our filling nutrient rich ingredients but also satisfy the tastebuds by incorporating a variety of spices and natural sweeteners.

Any advice for managing a team?

This is such an important question. When I was in college I attended a summer entrepreneurship program hosted at Stanford University (at the time it was called Silicon Valley Innovation Academy, but has since been renamed Moonshot Alliance). Through this program, I met many incredible people however — given my background in philosophy — was often annoyingly persistent about making my team consider the moral implications of our business decisions. I was struck by how often the response was “it’s not our job to think about every outcome of what we create”. Unfortunately, the more time you spend in the business/ innovation space the more you hear this type of thinking. I — in my perhaps pretentiously moral way — consider this a very dangerous thing. All the same when you get into a position where it’s cheeper to skip the compostable containers, more financially advantageous to market to the toxic diet culture I don’t believe in, (etc etc etc) morality becomes something like an obstacle in your pursuit for profit; which at the end of the day is (and has to be) the goal here.

I have found that the dilemma is not to be or not to be moral, but rather at what point compromising to make ends meet becomes compromising on your entire mission. My perhaps unsatisfactory response is simply to bear the responsibility of the owner/ manager / face of ones company and consider big and small decisions through the lens of “will this challenge the very mission I built this company to stand for”. If yes, no matter how much cheaper or easier it may be to cut corners, you simply must find another way; which at the end of the day is what an entrepreneur does best.

What’s been the most effective strategy for growing your clientele?

Prior to entering into this industry I seriously underestimated the power of branding in the food/beverage industry. Not only the aesthetics of our business itself but also having stickers, tee shirts and other merchandise that makes people feel like they’re apart of something they want to stand for, has proven to be immensely important. We provide a product, and for many months my focus was on making the product as good as it can be. A large part of that comes from making your team as good as they can be. However it really seems that almost equally as important is making your brand one that’s worth following, not merely your product one that’s worth purchasing.

It follows that growing out clientele has come from marketing stronger and branding smarter. As our holistic approach to wellness has become increasingly central to our company’s mission, we have brought in more and more clients in the holistic wellness spaces such as yoga/pilates instructors, locally owned gyms and nutrition professionals. Through figuring out what we want to stand for beyond good food, we’ve helped to harness a following and create community.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://grandviewpublic.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/joseys_grandview/

Image Credits
Haley Johnson