A spectral setting with silhouetted beings.

Beyond Artificial Intelligence: The Human Advantage Great Leaders Will Always Own

/in /by

One of the advantages of traveling to the same city often is that you begin to notice the difference between service and genuine hospitality. When I travel to Chicago, I generally stay at the same hotel and have a simple morning routine. Before heading into meetings, I stop in the dining room for coffee and breakfast, bringing my own packet of oatmeal and asking for a cup of hot water.

Not too long ago, before I had the chance to ask, someone quietly placed a cup of hot water on my table. There was no fanfare or scripted interaction. Someone had simply paid attention. They noticed a pattern, remembered my preference, and anticipated my need before I had to ask.

What made that small gesture so memorable had nothing to do with the hot water itself and everything to do with what it represented. Someone took a small piece of information and turned it into a meaningful experience. They didn’t simply remember a fact; they understood its significance and acted on it.

That is the difference between collecting information and creating value. It is also one of the most important distinctions leaders must understand as artificial intelligence reshapes the way organizations operate. AI will improve forecasting, accelerate decision-making, automate repetitive work, and uncover patterns that were once difficult to recognize. Those capabilities will become increasingly powerful and widely available. But technology alone will never create lasting competitive advantage.

The organizations that stand apart will be led by people who know how to apply technology with judgment, perspective, and purpose.

The Real Opportunity for Artificial Intelligence

Much of today’s conversation about artificial intelligence centers on efficiency by reducing costs, automating repetitive work, and improving productivity. Those benefits are real, and organizations that ignore them risk falling behind.

But history tells us that technology alone rarely creates lasting advantage. Email, cloud computing, and mobile technology all followed the same path. Each transformed business before eventually becoming commonplace. Artificial intelligence will be no different. As AI becomes more accessible, organizations will have access to many of the same capabilities. The real differentiator will not be who owns the technology, but who uses it more effectively.

In my opinion, the greatest opportunity AI offers is not simply helping organizations do things faster. It’s true value lies in helping leaders recognize opportunities sooner, anticipate challenges earlier, and make better-informed decisions. The organizations that create the greatest advantage will be those that use AI to strengthen human judgment, not replace it. The question is not, “How can AI replace work?” but rather, “How can AI help our people think better and create better outcomes?”

As leaders, our responsibility is to create a culture where people are expected and empowered to use technology intelligence to solve problems creatively and create experiences that customers remember, whether they’re installing a new software system or making a specialty cocktail.

Information Does Not Create Experience. People Do.

My Chicago hotel undoubtedly has information about me, including my reservation history, loyalty status, and travel patterns. But none of that information created a memorable experience. The experience was created because someone understood what the information meant and chose to act on it. That distinction is where many organizations miss the opportunity with technology.

Data is simply potential. It becomes valuable only when people use it to improve decisions, solve problems, strengthen relationships, or anticipate needs. Hospitality has understood this principle for generations. Great hotels remember the small preferences that make a stay feel personal like a room on a higher floor, a favorite pillow, or a cup of hot water waiting at breakfast. Exceptional restaurants remember guests’ favorite table, preferred wine, or dietary preferences, turning routine transactions into relationships.

The same principle applies in every industry. Data can help leaders see what they couldn’t see before, whether that’s a production issue, market trends, or changing buying patterns. But information by itself has never created trust, solved a meaningful problem, or delivered an experience people remember. That happens when leaders build organizations where people are empowered to act on what they know.

AI Should Amplify Leadership Not Replace It

One of AI’s greatest contributions will be helping organizations capture and share knowledge more effectively. Every company develops valuable insight through customer relationships, operational experience, successes, failures, and countless everyday decisions. Too often, however, that knowledge remains scattered across departments or exists only in the minds of experienced employees.

AI can now help us connect those insights, identify patterns, and make institutional knowledge more accessible throughout an organization.  It will reveal trends and even generate recommendations. But leaders must determine what those insights mean and how they should influence decisions. The reality is that artificial intelligence will make leadership even more important as the strongest organizations find ways to use it to amplify human capability by combining analytics with sound judgment.

The New Leadership Advantage: Asking Better Questions

As AI becomes part of everyday business, leaders will have access to more information than ever before. Their advantage will come from knowing which questions to ask, which insights truly matter, and what actions should follow.

An AI system may predict that a key customer is at risk of leaving, but a leader still has to determine why and decide how to rebuild the relationship. A high-performing employee might be flagged for declining output, but a manager must understand whether the issue is burnout, a lack of challenge, or something happening outside of work. In manufacturing, AI can predict that a critical piece of equipment is likely to fail, but leaders have to decide whether to invest proactively or accept the risk.

Great leaders will know when to trust AI-generated insights and when experience and human understanding should guide the final decision. As AI becomes commonplace, fierce curiosity and sound judgement will increasingly distinguish exceptional leaders from merely competent managers.

The Hot Water Test: A Leadership Framework for the AI Era

When I think about technology’s role in business, I return to that morning in Chicago. The hotel did not create a memorable experience because it possessed more customer data than anyone else. It created one because someone noticed something meaningful and acted on it.

That simple moment offers a valuable framework for evaluating artificial intelligence. Before investing in AI, leaders should ask three questions:

  1. Does this help us see something we could not previously see? AI should expand awareness and uncover insights that improve decision-making.
  2. Does this help our people make better decisions? Information creates value only when it changes behavior and improves outcomes.
  3. Does this create a better experience? The ultimate measure of technology is whether customers, employees, residents, and partners are better served because of it.

That is the Hot Water Test. Years from now, customers will not remember the algorithm behind an interaction. They will remember whether an organization understood them, anticipated their needs, and made them feel genuinely valued.

The reason I’ll remember that simple cup of hot water is because someone chose to turn information into a meaningful experience. No matter how intelligent our systems become, the greatest advantage leaders will always own is the ability to turn understanding into action.

Richard B. Schenkel, Founder and CEO of Phoenix3 Collective LLC

The Cost of One More Chance: Because You Can’t Run a Business from Hope Island

/in /by

One of the more common leadership mistakes I have observed throughout my career is not making bad decisions. It is delaying decisions that leaders already know they need to make. In most cases, underperformance is not a surprise. Leaders see it and discuss it; yet months and sometimes years pass before meaningful action is taken. It’s based on the belief that the next quarter will be better, the next project will go smoother, or the next promise will finally be fulfilled.

I sometimes refer to this as living on Hope Island. The organization knows there is a problem, but instead of addressing it, leadership becomes convinced that the next time will somehow produce a different outcome.

Building a business without optimism is nearly impossible. But hope is not a substitute for accountability, and it certainly is not a strategy.

The Cost of Staying

What prompted me to think about this were several situations I have heard about over the last year that share a remarkably similar outcome. Different organizations. Different industries. Different circumstances. Yet the decision-making process followed a very familiar pattern.

In each case, opportunities for improvement had been identified. Alternative approaches had been explored. The need for better performance was not in question. Yet when it came time to make a decision, leadership ultimately chose to stay the course and hope performance improved.

I get it. Replacing a long-standing partner can create disruption, introduce uncertainty, and requires time, energy, and effort. Continuing the existing relationship often feels easier. The reality is that staying has a cost too, and in many cases, that cost exceeds the disruption of making a change.

Years ago, I found myself making a similar mistake. Our organization was working with a web services provider that had been a good partner for many years. The relationship was positive, and the platform had served us well during early stages of growth. The challenge was that our business had evolved faster than their capabilities.

Reporting functionality was limited. New features we needed were not being developed. Integration opportunities were becoming increasingly important, but the platform could not support them.  My team recognized the problem, yet we stayed longer than we should have. Not because the provider was performing poorly, but because they were no longer positioned to help us get where we needed to go.

Looking back, I realized the true cost was not what we were paying. The real cost was the opportunities we were missing. We delayed improvements, postponed efficiencies, and limited our ability to capitalize on new opportunities because we were reluctant to make a difficult change.

That experience taught me an important lesson: sometimes a partner can continue delivering acceptable performance while simultaneously holding an organization back from achieving its full potential.

The reality is that this isn’t just a leadership problem. It’s a human one. Most of us have spent time on Hope Island ourselves. We stay on the same cell phone provider long after a better option exists. We continue using the lawn company that doesn’t do a great job because finding a replacement feels inconvenient. We stick with advisors, contractors and doctors that no longer meet our expectations because the familiarity feels more comfortable than making a change. In both business and life, we often tolerate situations that are merely acceptable because change feels uncertain.

Not Being Served

A friend recently shared a story that reinforced this lesson. For years, he worked with the same insurance broker and never questioned the relationship. Every renewal conversation was positive, coverage appeared adequate and pricing seemed reasonable. There was no obvious reason to look elsewhere.

Eventually, he decided to seek a second opinion. What he discovered was not fraud or misconduct. In fact, the broker had done many things well. The issue was that opportunities to improve coverage had been overlooked, cost-saving options had never been explored, and recommendations that should have been made years earlier were never brought forward.

His observation was simple but powerful. “I wasn’t being defrauded. But I certainly wasn’t being served.” That distinction matters. Many underperforming relationships are not disasters. They are simply relationships where expectations have stopped evolving, accountability has diminished, and performance is no longer being measured against what is possible.

Performance, Not Promises

One of the most dangerous questions leaders ask is: “Should we give them another chance?” A far better question is: “Have they earned another chance?” The distinction is important because promises and performance are not the same thing. Promises create optimism while performance creates confidence.

Exceptional leaders understand that confidence should be earned through measurable action, demonstrated results, and sustained improvement over time. They do not make decisions solely on what a partner says they will do. They evaluate what has actually been done.

The strongest organizations maintain high standards because they understand that accountability protects the interests of everyone involved, including employees, customers, residents, patients, and stakeholders.

Creating a New Standard of Accountability

One lesson I have learned over the years is that accountability should never depend on contract renewal discussions, annual reviews, complaints, or subjective opinions about whether things seem to be going well. Performance should be visible.

That belief has heavily influenced how we have built Phoenix3 Collective and why we invested so heavily in developing a proprietary technology platform focused on complete transparency around the metrics that matter most to our clients. We establish expectations upfront. We define key performance indicators together. We align on what success looks like and provide ongoing visibility into performance against those expectations.

When performance is transparent, accountability becomes part of the relationship rather than a difficult conversation at the end of it. Quite frankly, that is how every business partnership should operate.

The goal is not to wait until someone is asking whether a provider deserves one more chance. The goal is to ensure that everyone knows exactly how performance is tracking long before that question ever needs to be asked. Transparency creates accountability and accountability creates performance. Most importantly, it eliminates a trip to Hope Island in the first place.

Richard B. Schenkel, Founder and CEO of Phoenix3 Collective LLC

The Hidden Cost of Being Busy

/in /by

I want to tell you something that took me longer to learn than it should have.  The biggest threat to revenue in most B2B businesses isn’t competition., pricing pressure or market conditions. It’s the quiet, cumulative drain of a team that is genuinely, exhaustingly busy doing things that don’t necessarily move the business forward.

I have watched talented people work full days, weeks, quarters and produce results that don’t match their effort. It’s not because they weren’t trying. The issue is that they didn’t prioritize their work to have a direct impact on business growth.

In hospitality and food service, this pattern carries a cost that compounds quickly. I have seen business development directors spend days preparing presentations that don’t address client needs. Operations managers who were buried in systems coordination while client relationships sat quietly at risk. And senior leaders so consumed with vendor management and reporting that months go by without a meaningful strategic conversation with a key client. The revenue doesn’t disappear in a single moment. Instead trust erodes, renewals lapse, and new business that should have been won isn’t even pursued.

Here are four things I’ve learned, through founding, scaling, selling, and advising businesses about keeping a team focused on the activities that actually drive revenue.

1. Name the Revenue Activities Explicitly and Protect Them Like They’re Sacred

Most leaders assume their teams know what the highest-value activities are. In my experience, they often don’t, at least not with the precision that translates into daily prioritization. There is a meaningful difference between a team that knows revenue matters and a team that knows exactly which three to five activities, executed consistently and well, produces the majority of contract wins and revenue growth.

In any business, the revenue-generating activities are identifiable and specific: executive-level client conversations, contract renewal planning well ahead of expiration, new account prospecting with decision-makers, proposal development for qualified opportunities, and deliberate relationship cultivation with the people who influence buying decisions. These are not complicated to name. They are, however, remarkably easy to lose sight of. What gets protected gets done. What gets treated as optional gets lost.

2. Audit Where the Time Actually Goes Before You Assume You Know

Most leaders have a reasonable picture of how their team spends their time. Most of them are wrong.

There is a consistent gap between where leaders believe client-facing capacity is being invested and where it actually goes. The gap isn’t visible in any single day. It accumulates across the low-stakes decisions that no one flags: the internal report that takes four hours to produce and influences no decision, the weekly pipeline meeting that reviews activity without driving any, the approval chain that requires three sign-offs for a client proposal that should have gone out two days ago.

Ask your team to account honestly for where their time went last week. Then place that picture next to a clear map of what actually drives value in your business. The distance between the two is your opportunity. The harder part is being willing to eliminate, delegate, or redesign the internal work that is consuming capacity without producing commercial results. Any internal activity that doesn’t ultimately serve that relationship deserves serious scrutiny.

3. Don’t Make Avoidance Easier Than Client Engagement

This is underappreciated, and it has fundamentally changed how I think about organizational design in client-facing businesses.

People default to what is accessible, familiar, and frictionless. In most organizations, internal tasks are structurally easier to engage with than external revenue-generating work. The inbox fills with internal requests. The calendar populates with internal meetings. The administrative demand is constant, visible, and comes with social accountability, someone is always waiting on a response, a report, or a decision.

Reaching out to a prospective client is harder. Asking an existing account to expand their contract requires preparation and confidence. Navigating to the actual economic decision-maker in a large organization takes persistence. These activities tolerate rejection, require sustained initiative, and don’t offer the same immediate sense of completion that responding to an email does. So, they get deferred, not because the team doesn’t understand their importance, but because the organizational environment makes avoidance easier than engagement. The goal is an organization where doing the right work is the natural choice.

4. Protect Your Team from the Distraction YOU Are Creating

This one is uncomfortable. I include it because I have been guilty of it myself, and because I have rarely seen it addressed honestly in conversations about team performance.

Founders and senior leaders are frequently the source of distraction in their own organizations. Not intentionally, but the commercial effect is real and measurable. A new market opportunity mentioned in a leadership meeting becomes a research project that consumes a week of a business development leader’s time. A concern about a client account raised without full context triggers a round of internal meetings that pulls three people off active prospecting and marketing activity. A strategic pivot communicated mid-quarter disrupts a team that had been executing a focused plan with real momentum.

I have learned to apply a filter before redirecting my team’s attention: Is what I’m about to introduce more valuable than what I’m about to interrupt? If you want a team that does not chase distractions, the first step is ensuring you aren’t generating them.

Revenue Follows Attention

These four pieces of advice converge on the same underlying truth: in business, distraction is a revenue problem, not a productivity problem.

The founder’s job, at every stage of a business, is to build the conditions where the most important commercial work is also the most supported, protected, and clearly connected to the outcome everyone is working toward.  Because in the end, revenue comes from leaders who understand that in a relationship-driven business, focus is a competitive advantage.

Richard B. Schenkel, Founder and CEO of Phoenix3 Collective LLC

The Moment a Company Becomes Something Else

/in /by

I have found that growth changes a company in ways that are easy to quantify on a spreadsheet, but much harder to see until the experience itself begins to feel different. 

Early on, start-up decisions are guided by instinct, experience, and a very clear sense of what the company stands for. The founder is close enough to the work and the people to shape strategy and the thousands of small choices that ultimately define the experience. As companies grow, that dynamic inevitably changes. Scale introduces structure and processes. And over time, decision-making becomes more distributed and often more efficient. None of this is inherently negative, and in many cases, it is necessary. 

But it does raise a question that I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about both as a founder in the hospitality sector and as someone who has gone through the process of selling a company: 

What happens to a hospitality-driven business when the person who originally defined its standards is no longer shaping them every day? 

When Howard Schultz stepped away from Starbucks in 2000, the company continued to grow and evolve. Operationally, systems were refined, processes more consistent, and the business scaled in ways that would have been difficult in its earlier stages. 

I followed this carefully and was struck when Schultz himself spoke openly about the gradual customer experience shift that occurred during that period. The connection to what made Starbucks distinctive in its early days became less pronounced, not because of a single decision, but because of many small ones that moved the brand in a different direction over time. When Shultz returned in 2008, it was less about fixing a broken business and more about restoring something that had become diluted. 

Research consistently shows that founder-led companies tend to outperform their peers over time, in large part because of the clarity, conviction, and consistency that founders bring to decision-making. That influence is not just strategic; it shows up in the day-to-day experience. As founder proximity changes, the standards that were once reinforced through direct involvement begin to rely on interpretation. Not from lack of intent, but from distance. 

That dynamic becomes most visible in businesses where execution must match founder philosophy at scale. Consider how this played out at Chipotle Mexican Grill under Steve Ells. The QSR concept was innovative at the time and built on a clear culinary philosophy grounded in fresh ingredients, simple preparation, and a strong point of view about food quality. But as the company scaled rapidly, that philosophy became harder to execute consistently across a growing footprint. 

Operational inconsistencies and food safety issues emerged, and the brand had to work deliberately to rebuild trust and re-establish its standards. It was a clear reminder to me that when founder-driven standards are not reinforced with the same intensity, even strong concepts can drift in ways that are difficult and costly to correct. 

Fortunately, there are examples of founder-led companies that have maintained their standards at scale. Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts under Isadore Sharp is one of them. Four Seasons grew from a single hotel into a global luxury brand, expanding across markets and cultures while consistently delivering a highly personalized guest experience. 

What made it work was not just a strong founding philosophy, but how deliberately it was operationalized. The company’s “Golden Rule” was embedded into hiring, training, and daily decision-making. Sharp himself remained deeply engaged, staying close to the actual experience and not just the performance of the business. Leaders were developed to reinforce standards consistently, and employees were trusted and empowered to act in service of the guest experience in real time. 

The result was a company that scaled successfully without losing the essence of what made it distinctive. The Four Seasons demonstrates that maintaining a founder’s standard at scale is possible, but only when that standard is actively taught, reinforced, and protected by leaders who remain close enough to the experience to uphold it. 

I have seen these dynamics from a distance, and I have also experienced them firsthand. When I sold the hospitality companies I founded, it was with a clear understanding of the opportunities that would come with broader scale and resources. And in many respects, those opportunities were realized. 

I also believed that we had built a culture strong enough and developed leaders capable enough to carry forward the culture and standards that had defined the company.  But what became clear over time was that the culture was not being continually reinforced in the daily decisions; the ones that rarely show up in a playbook. Most critically, the willingness to make hard choices because they align with the brand’s conviction was lost.  

In recent years, I’ve had the opportunity to reconnect with a number of organizations that I worked with in the past. Many are taking a fresh look at their dining programs as part of the strategic planning process. It seems regardless of the sector, dining services are no longer being viewed as a support function; instead, they are seen as essential culture and performance drivers. 

My conversations are generally centered on a growing recognition that resident expectations have dramatically evolved, and in most cases, the current provider or on-site team is not delivering an experience that has kept pace with those expectations. Business leaders recognize that the difference between good and exceptional dining is rarely defined by systems alone. It is defined by consistency of standards and a crystal-clear point of view about what the experience should be. And as history shows, those elements require ongoing attention from accessible and engaged founders and leaders. Because, ultimately, this is the reality: 

The moment no one is left to say, “That’s not who we are,” the company starts becoming something else. 

Richard B. Schenkel, Founder and CEO of Phoenix3 Collective LLC

Creating Momentum: A Founder’s Guide to Branding

/in /by

Every industry, no matter how established, has room for brands bold enough to break the mold and redefine what great looks like. The ones that rise aren’t always the biggest; they’re the ones brave enough to think differently, act differently, and show up with purpose.

That truth was on full display at the recent LeadingAge Annual Meeting conference in our hometown of Boston. Walking the exhibit floor and watching thousands of people engage with brands in real time was a powerful reminder to me that opportunities to stand out are everywhere for those willing to be bold, thoughtful, and deliberate in how they present themselves.

Over the years, I’ve learned that building brands that truly break through doesn’t happen by accident. It takes courage, consistency, and a team that believes in what they’re building as much as you do.

Here are a few lessons that continue to shape our approach at Phoenix3 Collective:

1. Brands Win When Everything Connects

A standout brand isn’t built on a single moment; it’s built through experiences that feel connected, intentional, and authentic. Every detail matters — the design, the energy of your team, the way customers are greeted, the flavor of the product, the technology behind the scenes. Either it all tells the same story or it tells competing ones.

The brands that elevate above the rest are the ones willing to think in 360 degrees. They don’t rely on one touchpoint to carry the value proposition. They create experiences that invite people in, surprise them, and make them feel something worth remembering.

Great brands aren’t louder; they’re clearer. Clarity is a powerful differentiator.

2. Go Big or Go Unnoticed

In a crowded market, playing it safe is the quickest way to disappear. Standing out requires boldness that is visual, strategic, and emotional. It means knowing who you are and making sure the market knows it too. Whether launching a new brand or entering a new category, the brands that win are the ones unafraid to make a statement.

When we bring new companies into the Phoenix3 Collective, we don’t ease them in quietly. We give them the platform, presence, and confidence to show up like leaders from day one. That intentional visibility sparks conversations, curiosity, and opportunities.

Boldness isn’t bravado. It’s a commitment to who you are and the future you’re building.

3. Culture is the Secret Ingredient

The strongest brands don’t just have customers, they have believers. And that belief ALWAYS starts internally. Culture is the engine behind execution. It’s what makes teams resourceful, resilient, and aligned. It’s why you see people step into roles outside their titles, fill the gaps before they become problems, and treat the brand like it’s their own.

That’s the reason I allocated more than 30% of Phoenix3 Collective company ownership to employees. It was a decision many thought was unconventional, but I truly believe that ownership changes everything. When people have a real stake in the company, they think differently, act differently, and respond differently. Culture is the intangible force that turns good brands into great ones.

4. Momentum is Everything

Business momentum doesn’t come from luck, it comes from consistency, clarity, and conviction. When a brand shows up boldly, aligns its culture behind a purpose, and delivers with excellence, momentum begins to compound. Conversations turn into opportunities. And opportunities turn into growth.

Momentum is the magic that happens when you deliver on your promises and commitments.

Leadership is about fueling that flywheel, protecting it, and pushing it forward. As a founder, when your mission is shared and ownership becomes real, your brand starts attracting attention instead of chasing it. That’s when momentum becomes unstoppable.

The world needs more brands with courage, clarity, and conviction to break the mold. Because when you believe deeply in what you’re building, the future becomes yours to shape.

Richard B. Schenkel, Founder and CEO of Phoenix3 Collective LLC

The Power of Moving Fast and Thinking Big

/in /by

Throughout my career, I’ve taken advantage of opportunities to build and invest in high-potential companies. When we launched Phoenix3 Holdings, the intent was clear: identify innovative, underleveraged business opportunities where our leadership team has expertise, and add value as a strategic growth partner. But something unexpected happened along the way.

We didn’t just invest.

We built.

We created.

We transformed.

Today, I’m pleased to announce that Phoenix3 Holdings is now Phoenix3 Collective. This name reflects what we have become: a collection of boutique culinary and hospitality companies that design culinary programs and business solutions tailored to the unique needs of clients based on their industry sectors and preferred operating model. Each of our teams works collaboratively with our clients to define their goals and build programs that exceed expectations.

Why the Shift?

The term “Collective” is intentional. We’ve evolved from a strategic growth partner model providing investment and resources into a dynamic ecosystem of synergistic operating companies. Each company in the Collective has vertical segment expertise and shares a culture of entrepreneurship, innovation, and operational excellence.

In just the past 18 months, we’ve:

  • Launched Restaura, a purpose-built dining management services company filling a void in the senior living and active aging market by embedding technology into every facet of dining services to optimize client success and deliver unapologetically delicious, scratch-made culinary experiences.
  • Acquired Innovative Hospitality Solutions (IHS) to provide strategic advisory services to organizations that outsource hospitality services across healthcare, education and corporate sectors. From vendor transitions to ongoing performance oversight, IHS helps clients get more from their vendor relationships.
  • Acquired CrossCheck Quality Assurance, an industry-leading third-party, data-driven quality assurance and regulatory compliance platform that provides both customized QA assessments and prescriptive action planning across senior living, healthcare, corporate, and higher education. CrossCheck utilizes proprietary technology and coaching to help clients identify risks, ensure accountability, and drive continuous improvement.
  • Created Centicor Procurement Services as a client-focused group purchasing organization mindful of and responsive to each client’s culture and business strategy in corporate services, education, healthcare, seniors, hospitality, and leisure and recreation.
  • Acquired Infuse Hospitality, a workplace dining and hospitality company that brings restaurant-quality experiences to forward-thinking employers and workplace settings to elevate corporate dining into a culture-aligned amenity.
  • Created Culinour to transform healthcare dining management services by combining technology-driven innovation with culinary excellence to accelerate healing.
  • Most recently, our Collective acquired Quality Culinary Solutions, a consulting practice focused on improving the financial health and culinary experiences at self-operated senior living communities.

Each brand operates independently while contributing to something bigger. Together, Phoenix3 Collective delivers both full-service management solutions and à la carte services for active aging and senior living communities, corporate dining, higher education, and healthcare.

Our solutions support the business needs of clients who outsource their dining and those who self-operate or “insource.” No one else in our space is doing this because no one else can.

Speed Over Scale

This Phoenix3 transformation didn’t come from endless corporate planning cycles. It came from thinking and acting like a founder. There’s a reason entrepreneurs win in moments of disruption: we move fast. We’re not afraid to take risks. We don’t wait for permission. And we’re always looking around corners.

Think of it this way: the difference between an entrepreneur’s mindset and corporate operating model is like a speedboat compared to a battleship. Same ocean, very different ability to change course.

Our growth has been possible because we weren’t bogged down by bureaucracy. We seized opportunities as soon as they surfaced. And we surrounded ourselves with talented people who share our entrepreneurial spirit.

Lessons from the Journey

If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that success doesn’t come from sticking to the original playbook. It comes from staying close to the market, spotting gaps others don’t see, and having the courage to pivot. That’s exactly what we did:

  • When we saw senior living and active aging communities struggling with legacy dining models, we launched Restaura to fill the gap.
  • When we heard about frustrations with inward-focused sourcing solutions that provide limited customer transparency, we created Centicor Procurement Services to put the focus back on the client.
  • As companies reassessed their workplace hospitality needs and addressed the amenities required for a hybrid work environment, we acquired a controlling interest in Infuse Hospitality and brought in a seasoned industry executive, CEO Paul Fairhead, to evolve the brand and expand workplace dining solutions into new markets.

What truly binds our Collective together is more than our strategic alignment — it’s our shared ownership culture. Every Phoenix3 company is grounded in the same entrepreneurial DNA because our leaders and teams are all owners. I’ve set aside over 30 percent of each company’s ownership shares for employees, regardless of their title, because I know that an ownership mindset fuels collaboration, drives accountability, and unlocks a level of passion that can’t be manufactured in a traditional corporate structure.

When this type of culture is blended with cutting-edge technology solutions and a commitment to culinary excellence, it becomes a model that’s not just rare in our industry, it’s transformative.

Looking Ahead

Phoenix3 Collective isn’t just a rebrand. It’s a reflection of what we believe in: start-up energy, fast action, and focused execution. We’re not afraid to disrupt legacy models or build something that has never existed before. We’ve assembled a team of visionaries, operators, and change-makers who know the industry inside and out and aren’t afraid to reimagine it.

And we’re just getting started.

Thanks for following along the journey.

We’ll keep moving fast and building what’s next.

Richard B. Schenkel, Founder, CEO & Managing Director, Phoenix3 Collective

The Founders Mindset

A Conversation with Ross Dickmann. A Unique Perspective on Senior Living Dining from an Operator’s Point of View. See the Video Podcast Below.

/in /by

It’s been a busy few months at Phoenix3 Holdings as we grow our team, refine our focus, and build a cohesive culture across our operating companies. These are all critically important aspects of growth for any new venture, and, as a repeat founder, I am laser-focused on leveraging my past experiences to maximize our successes.

If you’ve been following our news via this LinkedIn page, you know that we have launched a new company called Centicor Procurement Services and acquired Innovative Hospitality Solutions and CrossCheck to offer a full suite of program management, project consulting, procurement, and quality assurance services for senior living, healthcare, education, corporate services, and recreation clients. We’ve also acquired a controlling interest in Infuse Hospitality, a workplace dining and amenity services company, and brought in Paul Fairhead, a seasoned CEO who previously was CEO of Guckenheimer. I will share my reflections and rationale for these strategic acquisitions in my next Founder’s Mindset newsletter.

For this edition of the Founder’s Mindset, I wanted to take a slightly different approach and share a conversation with a critically important new member of the Restaura team. Ross Dickmann has joined Restaura as Senior Vice President, Client Strategy and Integration. Ross brings an exceptional operational pedigree, leveraging over 30 years of distinguished senior living and hospitality leadership, most recently as Chief Operating Officer at Moorings Park Institute in Naples. Ross is highly experienced in managing complex corporate systems and specialized hospitality teams, consistently delivering best-in-class outcomes. He has a unique perspective on senior living dining from the operator’s point of view. In just a few short months, Ross has already made a significant impact.

I hope you enjoy this video version of the Founder’s Mindset, where we explore changing expectations, how to leverage technology to elevate hospitality, and what the future of senior living looks like…..

The Founder’s Guide to Making Tough Decisions

/in /by

Serial founders understand a fundamental truth: the faster you make difficult decisions, the better off your company will be. The phrase “fail fast” isn’t just about pivoting — it’s about recognizing when something isn’t working and having the courage to act.

Making tough calls is like anything else: the first time is the hardest, but practice makes it easier. As a founder, your decisions define the company’s trajectory, and the more decisive you become, the more confidence your team, investors, and clients will have in your leadership.

Here are three of the most critical decisions I’ve found most founders face — often sooner than they’d like. Each requires balancing short-term survival with long-term success.

1. Spending Wisely: Risk and Resources

Money is oxygen for startups, but how you spend it depends on your funding model. When you’re funding the business yourself, every dollar feels personal. This often leads to scrappy, creative problem-solving — a huge advantage when you need to stretch resources. But it also means constantly weighing every expense against its immediate impact on survival.

Many first-time bootstrapped founders hesitate too long before investing in key areas like hiring or marketing, only to realize later that strategic spending is just as important as managing expenses.

When we launched Restaura last year, for example, we made a big splash at the industry’s largest annual event to showcase our experienced team and innovative business model — a decision that has paid off significantly.

Alternatively, when your start-up includes outside funding, you’re not just managing cash —you’re managing expectations. Investors want aggressive growth, but they also tend to be less willing to invest ahead of revenue. The pressure to show traction quickly can lead to spending in ways that don’t always align with long-term strategy. Founders in this position must resist the urge to chase vanity metrics and instead focus on sustainable, high-impact investments.

Whether self-funded or investor-backed, the challenge is the same: knowing when to stay lean and when to go all in. The best founders develop an instinct for spending at the right moment, balancing caution with strategic risk-taking.

2. Choosing the Right Early Clients

The first clients of any B2B start-up set the tone for the business. It’s tempting to say ‘yes’ to every revenue opportunity, especially in the early days. But sometimes, the wrong client can slow you down more than no client at all.

Who are the best early adopters? They are…

  • Frustrated with the status quo and actively searching for a better solution
  • Eager to experiment because they believe in the potential of what you’re building
  • Open to providing feedback to make your product or service even better
  • Willing to share their experience with others

What types of early clients should you avoid?  They….

  • Don’t fit your long-term vision, despite their attractive revenue potential.
  • Push you to modify your core offering or customize features that won’t be repeatable
  • Create support or operational headaches that drain your team’s resources

Many founders learn the hard way that not all revenue is good revenue. Saying ‘no’ to a misaligned client takes discipline, but dilution of focus is a startup killer. I recently had to redirect one of Phoenix3’s operating companies away from a promising potential client. It was not easy, but it was absolutely necessary.

Early clients aren’t just buyers — they are the foundation of your flywheel.

Founders absolutely must treat early adopters like they are partners, be radically transparent with them, and deliver a notably exceptional experience. Those who do this well will build early adopters who aren’t just clients, they’ll be your champions.

3. Getting the Right People in the Right Seats

A startup’s success is directly tied to its people. Every hire carries weight and making a mistake can be costly. Skills are critical, but mindset and adaptability matter just as much — especially in the early days.

Founders often hold onto the wrong hires too long, either out of loyalty or fear of disrupting a small team. The best founders recognize that correcting a hiring mistake quickly is better than dragging it out. Remember, startups evolve quickly, and someone who was the perfect fit at one stage might not be later.

Every founder struggles with this, especially with small teams where letting someone go can feel personal. But the reality is that the wrong person in a key role slows everyone down. The best teams have a clear vision, aligned culture, and the right mix of skill and adaptability. A founder’s job isn’t just hiring — it’s constantly reassessing if the team is built for the challenges ahead.

Final Thought: Tough Decisions Make Great Founders

Every startup founder will face challenging decisions on spending, clients, and team members.

The first time, it takes courage. The second time, it takes confidence. The more you do it, the better you get. Tough decisions don’t get easier—but you get stronger and wiser.

Reach out to me at [email protected] if I might be able to add some perspective to tough decisions that you’re facing in this role.

New Year’s Reflections: Sentiment, Satisfaction, and the Power of Frontline Obsession

/in /by

The beginning of a new year is traditionally a time for reflection and planning – a moment to assess what worked in the past and to set ambitious goals for the future. Since I spent much of my time last year building and investing in new companies for the first time in quite a long time, I thought I’d share some observations about several nuanced changes I’ve noted, as well as the enduring principles that continue to shape successful ventures.

The Voice of the Customer

What hasn’t changed: Customer feedback is still the lifeblood of any business, and start-ups in particular. It provides valuable insights into user experiences, pain points, and expectations. By actively collecting and analyzing feedback, startups gain a deeper understanding of their audiences. Infuse Hospitality, a Phoenix3 portfolio company that provides corporate, commercial and specialty food and dining services, has leveraged feedback from building managers and end-users who are moving from remote to hybrid and in-office work to create engaging customized monthly promotions that serve each population’s specific dining preferences while maximizing profitability.

Remember that whether B2B, B2C, or B2B2C, it’s critically important that founders and executive teams recognize not all feedback is created equally. Be sure to prioritize feedback based on impact and feasibility. For example, a glitch in your product ordering system takes precedence over aesthetic concerns, such as tweaking the color scheme of an interface.

What has changed: Traditionally, customer satisfaction ratings have been the gold standard for evaluating success. For contract on-site foodservice relationships, that generally meant bi-annual surveys covering food quality, service standards, and a variety of other benchmarks. But satisfaction is retrospective; it measures how someone feels about a past experience. Today, it is imperative that founders leverage advances in AI and technology to capture how people feel in the moment. Real-time sentiment analysis enables founders to identify and address opportunities as they arise, rather than after they’ve become ingrained problems.

Waiting months to assess performance or customer satisfaction is no longer viable for any company – start-up or mega-conglomerate.

That’s why our Restaura team has built an industry-first resident sentiment analysis tool that analyzes comments, ratings, and team member inputs to tailor culinary experiences based on real-time input. Our talented technology team has created digital dashboards for our clients with real-time KPI tracking, including sentiment scores, so day-to-day decisions are guided by the most current insights. It’s game changing!

Ownership Involvement

What hasn’t changed: Since 1990, Bain consulting has analyzed the shareholder returns of public companies and found that companies with a founder still involved in the daily business outperform (by a factor of 3:1) companies that don’t have an engaged founder. This has been one of my core philosophies throughout my career as a founder, from start-up through acquisition, and carries through to my investment thesis at Phoenix3.

But here’s the thing I learned long ago. Being an engaged founder or business leader is really about creating a culture with a frontline obsession. You simply can’t succeed if there’s an ivory tower culture. The book Founder’s Mentality describes frontline obsession as a culture that keeps management laser focused on empowerment and respect for the team members who directly interact with customers. Founders who remain engaged in their business ensure this ethos is maintained by modeling frontline-centric behavior.

What has changed: We have all seen the dramatic shift in today’s workforce loyalty with employees more willing to change jobs in search of better opportunities or work-life balance. For founders this trend poses significant challenges, especially those in customer-facing industries where employee turnover can directly impact service quality and brand reputation.

There is a growing movement toward employee ownership models as a new standard of socially responsible business practice that can also drive company performance. Ownership Works is a nonprofit that partners with companies and investors to champion this approach which provides wealth-building opportunities for all employees, improves business performance and invigorates corporate culture.

I wholeheartedly believe that making frontline employees owners creates a win-win scenario. I have set aside over 30% of the equity shares in Restaura so all of our team members, from kitchen staff and servers to managers, have a personal stake in the company’s success. Providing ownership takes empowerment to new levels and fosters deeper engagement, accountability, and alignment with organizational goals.

Imagine what’s possible when the phrase “ownership involvement” is not just referring to the founder, it’s EVERYONE.

A Continuous Conversation

The future belongs to those who listen, adapt, and act. As we embark on this new year, let’s recognize that reflection and planning are no longer annual exercises but continuous processes. By embracing a frontline obsession and leveraging real-time sentiment analysis we can build organizations that are positioned for long-term success. Phoenix3 is actively looking to expand our portfolio with like-minded businesses. Click here to learn more about our ideal partner profile.

Let’s make it a year to remember!

The Anatomy of a Challenger Brand

/in /by

Founders are generally wired to seize opportunities. To build a better mousetrap, invent something new, expand a market. Yet certain new ventures tackle opportunities in a way that completely disrupts the status quo and, as a result, they earn the distinction of being known as a challenger brand. As we continue to build Phoenix3 Holdings through investments and our own start-ups, I have been thinking about the key factors that distinguish challenger brands from other start-ups.

It’s a Mindset

A challenger brand business model is designed to reshape a category and give customers a new way to think about their needs.

It’s about rethinking an accepted mindset based on evolving customer expectations and a sincere desire to change for the good.

Warby Parker is a great example of a successful challenger brand because the business redefined the rules of the eyewear industry with a direct-to-consumer model offering quality eyewear at a fraction of the traditional retail prices. The free home try-on program leveraged technology to innovate the customer experience. They grew quickly but continued to iterate with retail store fronts to further grow their brand presence. Warby Parker addressed customer pain points and focused on inefficiencies.

Technology as a Differentiator

In the food and dining space, Sweetgreen used its app to simplify ordering and emphasize sustainability when it launched in 2007. The company connected with an evolving tech-savvy audience and used customer data to refine their offerings and personalize experiences in a new way. This approach challenged industry norms and drove Sweetgreen’s early success as a challenger brand. In my opinion, challenger brands today must use technology as a differentiator. Whether through automation, AI or a predictive analytics, digital-first models are the only way to effectively respond to performance trends and succeed.

It’s Not Always a Challenge

Building a challenger brand is certainly not the only path to being a successful founder. If we stick with the fast casual segment, Five Guys and Raising Cains didn’t redefine their segment, but they successfully introduced higher quality options compared to industry stalwarts like McDonald’s and KFC. Similarly, when I founded Unidine in 2001, we adopted a fresh food approach to foodservice management, offering a higher quality solution for outsourced dining. We created a very unique corporate culture and built a successful business. We built a better mousetrap, but we were not a challenger brand.

Culture as the Lifeblood

When you take time to think about commonalities among challenger brands, you will find they all seem to cultivate an infectious culture. As the saying goes, “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” Anyone who has worked with me knows how passionately I believe in a consistent culture – top to bottom, from year one to 100.

Challenger brands must hire employees who are mission-driven, ask provocative questions, take risks and solve problems.

This is a very different type of employee than someone who thrives in a large organization where being a maverick can be considered a flaw. One radical approach to culture came from Netflix founder Reed Hastings who decided to run the company like a sports team, only keeping the very best.  Performance expectations were unapologetically high but paired with radical freedom like unlimited vacation and no expense policies.  The result was a company that was constantly adapting to market changes – successfully growing from DVDs to streaming and now a global content studio.

A Founder’s Checklist

Modern challenger brands are not focused on slaying a dragon; rather they take on an industry based on market gaps and embrace the underdog mentality. This is the approach we’ve taken with the recent launch of Restaura. We took a fresh look at a stale industry that is no longer meeting customer expectations, and we have woven our fearless approach into the fabric of our business processes and culture. From first-ever technology solutions and powerful branding to an employee ownership model that is game changing, we’ve purposely designed Restaura to fit into the Challenger column below:

Take a look at this short video to better understand my vision for the future of Restaura as a challenger brand. We are up for this challenge!