{"id":30424,"date":"2022-11-17T13:53:31","date_gmt":"2022-11-17T08:23:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.posist.com\/restaurant-times\/?p=30424"},"modified":"2023-08-24T17:17:53","modified_gmt":"2023-08-24T11:47:53","slug":"george-kunnappally","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.posist.com\/restaurant-times\/foodpreneurs\/george-kunnappally.html","title":{"rendered":"Nando\u2019s UAE Managing Director George Kunnappally On Entrepreneurship, Self-Awareness, and People Skills"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If the success of Nando\u2019s in UAE were to be associated with one person, it would undoubtedly be its managing director, George Kunnappally. He might not have built the establishment from scratch, but it is because of his entrepreneurial mindset, relationship with his employees, self-awareness, and sheer hard work that made Nando\u2019s an established business in UAE.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">His journey as a science student from Thiruvananthapuram to become financially independent, to enrolling in a hotel management course in Bangalore \u2014 this shift from a science major to the hospitality industry was purely accidental in Kunnappally\u2019s life. It was during a trip to a hotel with his father when he was completely enamored by the hospital industry. The discipline, glamor, the tastefulness of the hotels, and how everyone was on a mission to provide the best service are what intrigued and attracted him in the first place.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Interested in knowing more about George Kunnappally\u2019s journey to becoming a managing director at one of the most successful food establishments in the UAE? Let\u2019s dig deep!<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><strong>In Conversation With George Kunnappally, Managing Director of Nando\u2019s UAE<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This episode on F&amp;B talks with George Kunnappally about his journey in making Nando\u2019s a successful food chain in the UAE, the mindset he developed, the lack of entrepreneurial knack, and the change in the hospitality industry over the years. He also discusses how being self-aware was a key contributor to his success.<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"youtube-embed\" data-video_id=\"8pRbUYfm1hU\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"The Fiery Restaurant Trailblazer - George Kunnappally | Restrocast\" width=\"696\" height=\"392\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/8pRbUYfm1hU?feature=oembed&#038;enablejsapi=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Connection Between Self-Awareness and Success<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Although the hospitality industry intrigued Kunnappally, it was very early on in his career that he realized that hotel was not his calling. And no, it wasn\u2019t the excruciatingly long hours or the locations that were the issue, but this had more to do with his growth in the industry.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThe time from being a supervisory trainee to being the general manager of the property, in an ideal world, would be about 10 to 15 years. And I was like, I don&#8217;t have that much time,\u201d he says.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This sense of time was important to him because he was always interested in the amount of time it would take him to complete a task.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Additionally, during his initial days, he got to work with line managers that were extremely generous, and benevolent, and who made things easy for him by sharing their knowledge and experience. He further says, \u201cWhat took them five years to learn? They tried to impart that to me or transfer that knowledge to me in five months or two years. And I&#8217;ve been fortunate that way.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It was also an opportunity that his brother let go of, which led him to take up the offer and arrive in Dubai. These are some minor things that piled on, which makes Kunnappally describe his journey in the hospitality sector as serendipitous. \u201cI knew nothing about Dubai other than the fact that a lot of people are doing well here, and the quality of life is good, and it is safe,\u201d he says.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Having an Owner\u2019s Mindset<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Although Kunnappally holds a key executive position and is a major reason behind Nando\u2019s success in UAE, he is also quite aware that he was not cut out to be an entrepreneur. According to him, he cannot build a team from scratch, invest resources and take risks. This is probably why he has huge respect for entrepreneurs all around.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He believes that entrepreneurs are in it because they&#8217;re passionate and that they are creators of solutions, creators of projects, and creators of wealth. It is because of them that people like Kunnappally \u2013 salaried career professionals are more risk-averse and have better opportunities to achieve their vision.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Kunnappally has majorly worked with small businesses where he had to directly report to the owner, which led to them becoming a family over time. This is why even though he himself is not an owner, he does have an owner\u2019s mindset and it is the same quality he looks out for when hiring members for his team.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He further went on to give an example of decision-making to elaborate on his owner\u2019s mindset. Whenever he is making a big decision that has a monetary impact, and the data is not crystal clear, he looks at it from an owner\u2019s view \u2014 that if this is my business, what would the decision be?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That gives him a level of clarity that he didn&#8217;t have otherwise, and once he has made that decision, his conscience is clear in the sense that whatever way that decision goes, it was he who took the call.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cWith the owner\u2019s mindset, I didn&#8217;t take this call as a salaried resource, thinking it was already 6:00 clock. I got to rush,\u201d he says.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Being an Equal Opportunity Employer<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Kunnappally believes that a major test of being a leader in an organization has the ability to identify the closers. Closers are those employees in an organization who, when given a task, will get it done, come what may. These closers might not always hold executive positions in the organization, but they are as important to the business as your senior leadership or restaurant-level leadership.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">He further adds that making a difference or transforming is another major test of leadership than actually achieving sales targets and bottom lines.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Speaking about employees in his organization, Kunnappally also mentioned how he is a committed feminist and believes in equal opportunities for both genders. Although his notion of feminism doesn\u2019t just end with equal rights, he strongly believes that it only completes a full circle when people acknowledge that women can be equally or even more competent than men.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cAnd the fact and from experience, I can see in many fields they are far more competent than men. It does justify,\u201d he says.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Nando\u2019s was previously heavily dominated by men, but by making a conscious effort, today, nine of their almost twenty restaurants are managed by women. They run some of the busiest Nando establishments and hold key positions in the organization.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Relationship Between Operators and Delivery Aggregators<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Food aggregators are a crucial aspect of the hospitality industry. According to Kunnappally, his stance on aggregators has always been consistent, however bitter-sweet it might sound. He says that the aggregators cannot be entirely blamed if the customers want to use them and that many brands are on aggregators because they are unable to generate enough traffic on their own platforms.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In fact, Nando\u2019s had plans of developing their own mobile app to generate bulk orders, but taking UAE\u2019s lifestyle into account, they knew that it would be a difficult feat to accomplish because of the presence of Zomato, Deliveroo, and Talabat.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As Nando&#8217;s managing director, George Kunnappally, leads a team of nine direct reports and 450 employees spread across 19 restaurants, the Nando&#8217;s call center, and central support. Along with that, Kunnappally is also on the advisory board of the Dubai Restaurants Group, Global Restaurant Investment Forum, Middle East Food Forum, and Arabian &amp; African Hospitality Investment Conference. He not only advocates for issues that are important to Nando&#8217;s, but to the industry as a whole.<\/span><\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If the success of Nando\u2019s in UAE were to be associated with one person, it would undoubtedly be its managing director, George Kunnappally. He might not have built the establishment from scratch, but it is because of his entrepreneurial mindset, relationship with his employees, self-awareness, and sheer hard work that made Nando\u2019s an established business [&hellip;]<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":30425,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[810],"tags":[3037,3038,3039],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Fiery Restaurant Trailblazer - George Kunnappally<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"George Kunnappally shares his journey in making Nando\u2019s a successful food chain in the UAE, and changes in the hospitality industry.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.posist.com\/restaurant-times\/foodpreneurs\/george-kunnappally.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Fiery Restaurant Trailblazer - 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