If that means logging two straight 100-hour weeks to get a new Sonic unit opened, as he did last March while training workers in Fayetteville, N.C., he'll make do with a paltry four hours of shut-eye. Or fewer. One night, a group of supervisors gave him a dose of his own medicine, waking him at 3:30 a.m. for a marathon poker session. "Come on, you guys," a bleary-eyed Hartnett pleaded. Though Hartnett didn't appreciate it at the time, their behavior showed just how much they consider him--a poor boy from Mexia, Tex.--to be one of them. But the late-night wakings also emphasize the appeal of a more decentralized brand of management; it's unsettling to see a business that revolves so much around one man's personality. D.L. Rogers would be in deep grease without him.
Simplifying so many lives, it turns out, makes for a complicated burden. Hartnett isn't working smart; he's working all the time. And workers at D.L. Rogers repay him in kind partly because, despite his nearly 35-year tenure in the fast-food business, he's not above choosing the grimiest of jobs out of a distinctly unglamorous lot. Hartnett's rock-steady presence confers a certain dignity on what employees do, even though it drains him. "Jack works off pure adrenaline sometimes," says his wife. "I've told him he needs to chill a bit." He's aware of the toll it takes, but suggests that he won't live a long life and accepts that it's beyond his control to change that. "I hope somebody in my family one day says, 'You know, we wouldn't be where we are today if it hadn't been for that sacrificial lamb of our family," Hartnett says.
Between now and then, for as long as he can, Hartnett vows to be there for his employees in any way possible: as a caring confidant, a stern taskmaster, a clear-eyed caretaker. He'll even cook for them. At a recent store opening, he whipped up a vat of taco salad from scratch for 20 workers at the end of a grueling 15-hour day. "Go on and help yourself," he urged, clad in gray sweats and a Big Dog T-shirt bearing the phrase "Leader of the Pack." "There's plenty more."
Marc Ballon is a staff writer at Inc.
Jack's Recipe
What makes Jack Hartnett's recipe for managing people so pungent is the fact that he combines, in equal parts, ingredients from both the Stone Age and the New Age.
The blunt-talking president of D.L. Rogers doesn't shy away from making--and rigidly enforcing--his distinctive set of rules. But his penchant for hardened hierarchy doesn't preclude him from caring about his employees' personal lives (in his characteristic over-the-top fashion) or from demanding that they share in the ownership of the company's 54 franchises of Sonic drive-in eateries.
Here are some of the management principles that Hartnett has put to use at the high-frying company:
1. Show Them the Money. Hartnett believes the best way to motivate people is to give them what he covets most: cash, and lots of it. If money is what makes the world go round, it's also what keeps D.L. Rogers managers moving. "We're all money motivated," he says. "If someone tells you they're not, they've just committed one of the eight sins of this company." Those who have had to memorize his roster of commandments know that he is referring to the fourth commandment: You don't lie to me.
2. Share Their Secrets. Hartnett has built D.L. Rogers on a complicated web of relationships. The more he knows about his workers, the more he can help them stay focused at work and happy at home. No subject is too delicate for his ears. "There are no secrets here," he says.
3. Serve Them Thick Stakes. Most fast-food chains give managers and supervisors little more than an occasional free meal. At D.L. Rogers, executives have to buy equity stakes in the stores they run. "Some franchisees in Sonic say to me, 'Jack, I can't believe you sell 25% of your stores to your managers.' I think to myself, 'You greedy bastard. You'd do a helluva lot better if you did, too."
4. Put Butterflies in Their Stomachs. Hartnett rarely yells or screams at his managers or supervisors. He doesn't have to; as far as he's concerned, queasy does it. So frightened are they of provoking him that they go out of their way to please him. "If you're really nice and you occasionally get upset, you'll get their attention," he says.
5. Be a Commanding Presence. Hartnett doesn't hope people do what he wants; he tells them exactly what he expects and how to get there: "I want people to want to do what I want them to do."
6. Sweat the Small(est) Stuff. In Hartnett's world, to delegate is to shirk responsibility. He's the master of minutiae. He can converse as easily about hamburger buns as cash flow. Nothing escapes his attention. He'll even rummage through a trash bin to see what customers are not eating. "If they're throwing away fries, maybe we're not cooking them right," Hartnett says.
Sonic's Boom
By now you'd think that drive-in restaurants would be in the same shape as that other icon of the 1950s, Elvis: occasionally sighted but hardly vibrant. But in a $36 -billion industry dominated by the Big Three (if you've got a television, you know their names), Sonic Corp. has steered its way through cutthroat competition to claim the title of America's fifth-largest hamburger chain . Last year Sonic--which comprises 1,769 company-owned or franchised drive-ins in 27 states--posted revenues of $1.1 billion with net profits of $19 million, up from $46 million and $941,000 in 1990. Over that same time span, the publicly traded company, which is based in Oklahoma City, also recorded aggregate same-store sales growth of 7%, the industry's highest.
What consumers seem to savor most about Sonic is its decidedly retro flavor. "With the exception of McDonald's, they have the best brand loyalty in the business," says restaurant analyst David Geraty.
