Communication Leadership Style Team Success

Inspiring the Team

Andrew Chau

04.14.22

"As things get more automative, more robotic, the way you differentiate yourself is you have to be more human." Those are words that Boba Guys CEO, Andrew Chau, lives by. He credits a leadership style centered around empathy as a way of inspiring his team.

Summary:

“As things get more automative, more robotic, the way you differentiate yourself is you have to be more human.” Those are words that Boba Guys CEO, Andrew Chau, lives by. He credits a leadership style centered around empathy as a way of inspiring his team.

Thuy

I love the way your passion shines through when you talk. And so, how do you use this passion to inspire your team and your customers?

Andrew Chau

You know what I will say is, it sounds cheesy, but I say this enough, so you'll see that I say this enough, is that, the world's in a really tough spot, and it's really messy. So, I can make one person's lives better, because I'm a CEO, I could probably make 400, 500 people on my team better. But that's really it. I can only change maybe five minutes of one of my guests or customers—what we call our guests—their lives, if they're going through something radical. I had one recently that was really touching, where somebody was going-- their parents were going through chemo, and their hospital’s next to a Boba Guys.

And so, coming to a Boba Guys, they say they could always pick up a couple of drinks for their parents and themselves at the hospital. I mean, even thinking right now, I’m super touched by it. Because I think, you know, we're just human people, and as things get more automated, more robotic, especially even in our industry, the way you differentiate yourself is, you have to be more human. I do think my signature of what people say is my leadership style, is that I’m pretty strong in my empathy.

Yeah, I do think for most CEOs at my size. I'm more of like a sensitive feeler, I'm from the school of Brene Brown, if you know who she is, Dr. Brene Brown, and dare to lead, and having pretty good emotional IQ. It's kind of like what I try to impart to my team.