
Charles Watson
chief development officerTropical Smoothie Cafe and Tin Drum Asian Kitchen
The Mistake: When I was working with our CEO around 2012, I was the vice president of franchise development for Tropical Smoothie. This was when we...
Even born leaders have learning curves. In this feature, local insiders share their wisdom and talk about mistakes that shaped their business philosophy.
The Mistake: The mistake we made was that we totally ignored the culture of a company we took over. When I look back at my career, I had the...
The Mistake: When I was working with our CEO around 2012, I was the vice president of franchise development for Tropical Smoothie. This was when we...
The Mistake: My mistake was relying too heavily on one account or client. When a client knows you’re relying so heavily on them, they have...
The Mistake: Wearing myself out. When I started my career with Procter & Gamble in 1989, I often heard two things: Lunch is for losers, and you...
The Mistake: My mistake was coming into a changed management situation thinking I could win over stakeholders with just a smile and a strategy. As a...
The Mistake: Believing people's explanations about why they're leaving the company. I typically trust people. I take them at their word until I’m...
The Mistake My mistake was not valuing human resources as a strategic business asset. We’re in the HR business, and our business mission is to make...
The Mistake: Not having a leadership plan in place that accounted for rapid growth. Our company really started in 1999 as a dot-com when rapid growth...
The Mistake: I learned from direct experience that raising money is a very difficult thing for some entrepreneurs. They come up with an idea and go...
The Mistake: Back at another company that I had been a co-founder of ... I made three bad hiring decisions. I think the talent was mostly there but...