HR Break Room · 2025-07-25 · 25 min
Slim Chickens' expansion from one Fayetteville restaurant to nearly 300 locations globally has been built on Tom Gordon's people-first leadership philosophy. Gordon credits his success to hiring great talent, trusting employees from day one, and maintaining a family-oriented culture across franchises - even when expanding internationally. His approach to technology is pragmatic: every tool must either improve the guest experience, ease the franchisee's burden, or improve margins. He uses Paycom for payroll and scheduling to eliminate friction for employees, allowing them to focus on their work rather than administrative overhead. Gordon emphasizes that failures are his responsibility while successes belong to his team, a mindset that cascades through the organization. He shares a standout employee story - a woman hired at 19 who progressed from hourly employee to area director and now manages UK operations after 19 years. Looking back, Gordon acknowledges he was too stubborn about rejecting outside investment early on and would have pursued faster growth, though his bootstrapping approach preserved cultural control. The conversation reveals how operational excellence, genuine leadership presence (he visits stores to connect personally), and removing bureaucratic obstacles enable both employee retention and franchisee success in a notoriously high-turnover industry.
Tom Gordon starts with a personal leadership philosophy where he takes responsibility for failures while crediting the team with success, creating accountability that cascades through the organization. He combines this with frequent in-person visits to stores, interpersonal connection with managers and crews, and selective use of technology to eliminate friction, ensuring franchisees and employees feel supported rather than micromanaged.
Gordon uses technology strategically only when it improves guest experience, eases franchisee operations, or improves margins. Examples include the Slim Chickens app (launched pre-COVID to stay ahead of consumer expectations), Paycom for digital payroll and scheduling to eliminate manual processes, and electronic hiring platforms to speed up recruitment without adding administrative burden to store managers.
Gordon combines competitive pay, a safe working environment, clear growth opportunities, and genuine interpersonal connection from leadership. He visits new store openings, hugs kitchen staff, calls employees' families, and keeps his door open - making team members feel valued and secure enough to invest years in the brand rather than moving to competitors.
Gordon assesses whether candidates are ready to meet exponentially greater complexity; managing multiple locations is 'times five' more complicated than managing one store. He promotes people who make themselves indispensable - those he can task with responsibility and trust will handle it without worry, showing they have become leaders by choice rather than just title.
Gordon regrets being overly stubborn about rejecting outside investment early on, believing he could have grown faster and reached 500 locations instead of 300. He would be more open to outside capital while remaining firm on protecting the brand's values, people focus, and operational integrity.
Computed from the transcript - who did the talking, and the words that came up most.
Listen to our conversation with Tom Gordon, CEO and co-founder of Slim Chickens, to discuss the meteoric rise of this fast-casual restaurant. Gordon walks us through Slim Chickens' growth from a garage in Arkansas to nearly 300 locations around the globe. During the discussion, Gordon touches on how this bold growth plan was powered by automated tech that helped hire, onboard and develop a rapidly expanding workforce. As the franchise business continues to grow, Gordon also discusses how he and his leadership team are able to maintain Slim Chickens' core identity from store to store. Finally, we touch on how Slim Chickens developed a succession plan to ensure continuity to this day. This is a must-listen conversation for hospitality professionals and growth-minded leaders alike. Check out this episode of the HR Break Room ® !
Transcribed and scored by The B2B Podcast Index.
Speaker A: HR Break Room is brought to you by Paycom, empowering employees nationwide with HR and payroll tech in one easy app. Learn how Paycom simplifies business for your entire workforce at paycom.com
Speaker B: hello, everyone, and welcome to the HR Break Room, Paycom's podcast dedicated to giving quick conversations on the hot topics in hr. I'm your host, Trudaisi Thomas. In today's episode, I'm joined by Slim Chickens CEO and co founder Tom Gordon. Slim Chickens is one of the fastest growing franchises in America. Founded in 2003 with a single location in Fayetteville, Arkansas, Slim Chickens has expanded to nearly 300 locations globally, including franchises in the United Kingdom and forthcoming ventures in Germany. As a paycom client, slimchickens is an example of how to successfully manage rapid growth while sticking to your organization's roots. That's why we're excited to dive into Tom's philosophy of, uh, scaling your people to scale your business. We'll also have a chance to hear how his experiences in commercial kitchens helped inform his approach to succession planning. With that, let's jump into the HR Break Room. Tom, thank you so much for having us here in beautiful Fayetteville.
Speaker C: Happy to have you. Glad to be here.
Speaker B: So I want to, you know, introduce our audience to really, the beginnings of Slim Chickens. What really inspired you to open the first Slim Chickens?
Speaker C: It's a great story because after a finance degree in college, I just found myself doing restaurants. And I loved it. You know, I love restaurants. I love all restaurants. I love sandwich shops, I love white tablecloth restaurants. I love all restaurants. And I kind of found my niche, you know, working for small restaurant brands and big restaurant brands. In my 20s, right after college, when I was in California, um, my partner, Greg Smart called me and really the idea was sort of his. He goes, no one's doing this right. Like, we need to do it right. I'm doing retail, you're doing restaurants. Let's come back, join forces, and do it right. So we wanted to make our offering and our menu and our experience better than anybody else. Um, of course, believe we have, um, and that was the original impetus of the why of Slim Chickens. We thought we could do this better. We could deliver a better product, a better menu set, uh, and a better experience.
Speaker B: Right? And really, after opening the first location, what was the moment you realized you really were onto something big?
Speaker C: I think we knew that soon because very quickly after we opened, like within days and weeks, we saw repeat guests. And when people start coming in often to spend their money, you know, you Got something. And so we would make sure we took good care of the guests, good care of the repeat guests. But when you. When you see that repeat guests over and over again, uh, you know, you know, something's working, right? And now we have guests come in four or five days a week. I have a lady who's a professor who I've seen for years, and she comes in every day for lunch every day. And so that's. It's been, you know, that. That sort of thing. You know, you got a little something going on there.
Speaker B: Well, that's just so special, too, you know. Do you know her by name, too, who she is? And you say, gosh, wow, that's. That's incredible. So let's go. Go ahead and talk about what's contributed to Slim Chicken success, um, as the business has expanded rapidly. And how do you maintain the same culture and quality of product across all of your locations?
Speaker C: I mean, that is the challenge of scaling a restaurant brand. Can you maintain the same quality, the same service level, the same culture inside the stores in multiple states and now multiple countries? For us, uh, you know, it starts from the top down. It starts with, you know, me as the leader of the organization and kind of a personal leadership philosophy that I believe in, and to make sure that the team knows that I've got their back and the next person down has their back, and the next person down has their back. And we, you know, it's family. People say it's cliche, it works like a family, but it is, right? We spend as much time there as we do at home and creating the atmosphere where we can trust each other or we can work hard, or we can believe in what's going on and not pick and micromanage and leave a meeting with different ideas and different alignment. I mean, you know, we might fight and cuss and leave blood on the walls in the meeting room, but when we all walk out of there, we have a decision made and we're all aligned in the same direction. But it's. It's the. My personal philosophy about leadership is, you know, in the end, like, everything that goes wrong, every failure is ultimately my fault. I didn't do something right. I didn't hire right. I didn't fire right. I didn't make the right decision. But every success really isn't. Every success belongs to the people because they're doing the work. They're making things happen. And I think, you know, having a real buck stops with me mentality, and that permeates down. That's what Everybody thinks. So suddenly you're pushing all the success, the restaurants, and the success comes from those people that are servicing the guest and that. And if we're winning there, we're going to win everywhere else.
Speaker B: That's an incredible philosophy. The fact that you're saying that this failure is yours, but the success isn't.
Speaker C: And it's kind of how it always is, and that's how that should be.
Speaker B: You know, gosh, I mean, it sometimes isn't. So, like, with your talking about the trust, you know, people are saying, trust is earned, whatever it may be. But how do you really kind of focus on that trust within your. Your culture? And, and how do you, like, just establish that?
Speaker C: We, uh, say, you know, we hire people to do. Not to stand at the door and take orders. We're going to start with that. Like, we're going to believe in you until there's a reason not to. If you come in our organization like you got, you get hired for a reason, and we believe in you from day one. To begin this journey with us to being your. To begin your journey with us and to make an impact. And, uh, you know, there's all sorts of funny stories about that. My HR team could tell you about HR and vacation time and all this crazy stuff. And, you know, I had a one time a person came and we had a new system, might have been paid, I can't remember, but I think our chief operating officer put in for a vacation time, and he goes, you have to approve it. And I'm like, I got to do what? I have to approve a chief's vacation. Really? Because. Yeah. And I said, okay, look, we're never gonna do this again. I said, if one of my people, one of my direct reports, puts in vacation, just make it automatically approved, whatever it is, I don't care. And, um, you know, my HR person was like, well, you don't want to know what. What's going on. I said, I'll know if they're working or not. That me approving seven days in a row has nothing to do with whether I know what's going on. I think that's just a piece of the trust. Right? There's no reason to, you know, get down in the squabbles of, are you punching a clock and are you working this many hours a day, this many hours a week? I mean, we all do that now. I think everybody in this room probably is texting on Sunday afternoons and at night, in the morning, having coffee and looking at your email like, we're all Doing that. And I think if you believe in the people, then you believe in that. And so you don't have to go down this road of micromanaging and like intensive oversight of time spent.
Speaker B: So kind of speaking to that with like the approvals and all of that, how have you leveraged technology to really help your business grow?
Speaker C: I think that every piece of technology that we utilize, and a lot we don't, but it has a particular purpose. It's got to make things easier for us, make things easier for the franchisee, make the customer experience better, or improve margin for the franchisees. You know, things like the app. Like we did an app before COVID because we thought it was just table stakes. We had to do it and it was kind of early and it was very expensive, but good thing we did. It's a huge piece of our business. It's a huge piece. Now we have millions of app users and using the things and meeting the guests where they are at the particular time in space. That's what technology can do. No one used an app 12 years ago, but everybody does now. And so we have to be open to those types of changes, that type of evolution and the things that we need to do to make sure we meet the guests experience and expectations of using our brand. Because we always say we want a frictionless experience. Like, I want it to be easy to come to slim chickens. I want to be easy for the mom with five kids in the van to come. I want it to be easy for the two business guys to come. I want it to be easy for the grandparents to show up like everybody. It's frictionless. Technology helps with that. And any way you want to use the brand, engage with brand, whether on your app, your laptop, drive through dining room, every experience has to be as frictionless as we can make it. Will we ever be perfect at that? The answer is no. But I think that as we strive for that and reach for perfection, we can deliver what makes a successful business to the guest.
Speaker B: So let's transition from the guest to your employees. Them having certain simple software that they know their paycheck is correct, they can control. Again, when I submit pto, it's approved, you know, automatic, automatic. So what has that done for your employees to bring them their best selves to work?
Speaker C: Well, we've come a long way from the days of us writing hand checks for payroll and waiting till after 6 o' clock on Friday to let people get them because we'd run out of money if they catch them on a Friday before the Weekend, we used to do that. Um, but, you know, I think that just reliability is the key thing. Utilizing digital payment plans and, you know, it's all together, right? It's schedule, it's payment, it's, you know, time off, it's leave, it's whatever. But making that a frictionless experience too, is great for the guests, or I mean, great for the, the team member. So just. And then it's, then it becomes reliable. Like, you know, you need your paycheck, it's going to be in your bank, it's going to hit this Thursday afternoon, you know, it. The reliability so that a team member can feel comfortable in their life. That's the old rule. Why you pay senior executives a lot of money because you don't want to think about worrying about paying mortgages and car payments. Um, that needs to be taken care of. You want them worried about the business. And the same rule applies up and down any org chart. Like reliability, like personal safety, personal stability. That's what technology can deliver vis a vis a, uh, payment system, because they know they're going to get it right.
Speaker B: And like you just explained your employees, they really played an integral part in your success with slim chickens. So what qualities do you look for when assessing if someone is really ready to start, you know, a new store or be in a new region?
Speaker C: I think it's all about kind of are they ready to meet the next challenge? Because you have a new store, if you have a second store is a lot. It's like, it's, it's exponentially more complicated. I remember when we did it, you know, we had one store, we got it kind of running pretty good and making a few bucks, clicking along, you know, in a second store. And the complication was like times five, because you suddenly had all these disparate systems. Nothing was talking to each other. We had a, you know, handwritten payroll here, handwritten payroll here. We then did Digital payroll at 1, but we couldn't do it together. Uh, and that example is across the entire strata of technology and effort. Um, the way you order food, the way you have your balance sheet, the way it's just exponentially more complicated. Which is why multi unit restaurant business is tough. It's a tough thing to crack. Um, but you crack it with intensive focus and great people.
Speaker B: Now, once those leaders have been identified, what does that career development look like for them within the organization?
Speaker C: I mean, I think the sky's the limit. I hope that there is some, you know, young person inside a restaurant today that wants my seat someday. I. I think that, I mean, aspiration, desire is what fuels the American dream, you know, of course. And I think the sky's the limit for anybody. It. It's only a matter of, you know, how you're going to work at it, how you become indispensable, how you get promoted up the chain. And we believe that. You know, I always have said that those who get promoted seem to be indispensable. You don't want to live without them, so they get promoted. And if you make yourself indispensable, at least in my world, then you have a great career, uh, path and opportunities to continue to move up the ladder and, you know, eventually take all the top spots, including mine.
Speaker B: I really admire that for, you know, CEO being like, it's okay to hire people that might be coming from my job or a little better than me in certain ways.
Speaker C: I think you should. I mean, uh, there's no sitting on this pile of gold as a king. That's not evolute. It's not evolving. You know, I think it's more important to bring in minds and talent that can meet the demands of today. And, you know, I've done it for 22 years. There's a lot I don't know, there's a lot I just don't look at because I've done it for so long. I've had my eyes on it for 22 years. New sets of eyes, new ideas help and evolve the business and expand the business. And when you really hire a superstar, like a real, A player, like, I was talking to one of my guys about this today. Like, you know, an A player is like an exponential force for good. Like, you're not getting one person that can do one great job. You're getting one person that can do like five things. And that's the magic of hiring great people.
Speaker B: Well, can you share any employee success stories that really just stick with you?
Speaker C: Uh, I mean, there's tons of them. Uh, you know, they're the one that. The longest term employee success story. I had a nice young lady who came to work for me when she was 19, and she hourly employee, assistant manager, manager, area director, trainer, traveling trainer, and then went to open the first store in the uk. And the UK guys loved her and said, could she stay for a while? So she stayed for a few months and then they said she'd like to stay here. And I asked her, I said, you want to stay there? And she said, yeah. So now she lives in the uk, works with our franchisee there, and has been with the brand for 19 years. And it's a. It's just a great story.
Speaker B: And it seems like it takes trust on both ends. I mean, starting at 19, she still has, uh, every opportunity.
Speaker C: I think she was 19, and now it's about 19 years she's been with us. I think 18, 19, but it's a long time.
Speaker B: Yeah, right. But it's like establishing again that trust and then on both sides that she knew that she had a solid job that she can grow in. So what do you have to say about that when it comes to, like, what. First of all, what kind of, um, personality traits did you see in her to be ready to be promote? Promoted. Excuse me? And then what about. What do you think on, uh, her end? Did she have that security, or was it something that she had to trust with you all?
Speaker C: I think for her, the security grew over time because we just had one store and then we had two, then we had five, then we had 10, then we had 30. And she saw. She saw the evolution of the brand, and so she believed there was a path for not just income, but a real career. And, you know, when you work for somebody for 10 years, and that's a long time, and what's next, right? Next for her was to go to Europe, and that's a great next step. Could still stay with the brand and have a whole new, you know, experience over, uh, there. She's been there, you know, like I said, eight years or something like that so far. You know, on the flip side, you know, the trust for me in a person is when you know you have a great, talented asset in a person, when you can task, uh, them with doing something and you just don't worry about it. Right. Like the worries offshore. Hey, take care of this store this weekend, or can you handle this the next three days? Or I gotta leave town. Can you plug in right here? And they're like, yeah, I got no problem. And boom, it's done. And if you trust that it'll work, then that stress is off your shoulders and you have a chance to do the other thing that you got to do. I think that really is the trust side for an employee. When you and a team member, that really takes, you know, they take control of the situation. They become the leader because they want to be.
Speaker B: So how does tech help you hire and onboard employees?
Speaker C: You only hire with tech now. Like, you don't do it any other way. Like, you used to come in and people fill out stuff like that. Never happens anymore. We use all of the typical platforms for looking for people. We also do all, you know, you do all the electronic, like filings and background checks. It's. It's all done electronically now, digitally. I think it makes it easier. It makes, it makes the experience quicker for the perspective higher. The time that a GM has to spend on hourly team members to do that is really cut down. That used to take ages. Now it's pretty fast. And they can interface with the POS or a laptop in the store and get all of it done, you know, digitally. That. That makes the whole process quicker and more efficient. And when it comes to running restaurants, like, if you're fast and efficient, that's what you got to have M or
Speaker B: kind of go a little bit back. But given that notoriously high turnover that fast casual restaurants have, how do you build and maintain a culture where people want to stay?
Speaker C: I think, uh, there's so many intangibles to culture. I mean, one, the level playing field is a great place to work with a quality paycheck, and it's a safe environment and you have people around you that you like. Step two is, is there greater opportunity? And I think that you got to kind of, you know, put both in front of a great perspective talent to get them to come on board. Beyond that, I think it's really interpersonal connection and touch. I mean, you know, when I go in my restaurants, I go back there in the kitchen, give the guys hugs and how you doing? And high five of people. And I know a lot of the managers and GMs that are in the restaurants around here and a lot that are around the country. Not all, of course, anymore, but the other things I try to do is whenever there's a new store opening with a franchisee that I've. That's opening their first store, I try to go. I go take pictures with the crew and hang out and, you know, do that sort of thing. I had a guy that got on FaceTime and he called his mom and I talked to her and this is founder some chickens. I'm like, hey, how you doing? And. But that sort of stuff is not only fun, but it ingratiates not me, but kind of the ethos of the brand with all these new people that are working at the restaurant and, you know, they know that the leaders will be engaged and be a part of their business. And I'll help it.
Speaker B: Gosh, the people. You just are always for people.
Speaker C: It's always people. Gosh, it's always people.
Speaker B: Yeah, it is really cool to have a hug from your CEO in the kitchen. Just thinking, man, there is something that really does change about that. Like you said, just the ethos. Yes, it's for you, but it's also for them. And that culture, I think that's absolutely incredible. We do see Chad around. Our CEO, He.
Speaker C: He's.
Speaker B: He'll be eating in the lunchroom. And there's just something about that that just makes you feel more connected to your company and that he's part of it with you.
Speaker C: I, uh, think he's in a. In. In this day and age where there's so much noise on social media and people put anything they like or don't like out for the public world to see, being real and genuine and accessible, like, is a absolute must. My door's open. Everybody in the office has my cell phone. I'm like, call me or text me if you need something for real. And I think that everybody in the organization behaves that way and acts that way. And that contributes to not just the culture of like, hey, we're all engaged, but it's like, there's a safety net there. There's a way to kind of communicate and connect with people. If you can't reach your first person, you might connect with. And I think that giving. Giving a team member, whether in the restaurant or in the corporate office, just security around how they work every day is critically important.
Speaker B: So if you can go back to Slim's first expansion, is there anything you do differently?
Speaker C: I mean, I would do a lot differently, uh, as you might imagine, but I say that and, like, well, you know, would you have gotten this far if you did things differently? It's hard to say. I mean, I think there's a. There's a geographical strategy that could have been a bit better deployed in my younger days. I just, I just didn't know that. I tell people often that you shouldn't be closed off to taking outside investment. Uh, you know, I was like, no way. I'm myself and blah, blah. You know, we've done some things in the past since then. It was 22 years, but early on, if there may be a way to grow faster and, you know, your slice of the pie might be worth just as much if you can go faster. And speed is as important as anything in terms of growth and scale. Momentum is key. So, you know, I think I should have been a bit more open to that sort of thing and maybe could have gone faster. You know, we might. We might be at 500 stores now instead of 300 and change. Uh, who knows, right? The outcome's been good either way. But I think, you know, I look back at that and I was pretty stubborn and hard headed about that and, and maybe I shouldn't have been.
Speaker B: I mean, could you translate that to being hard headed and stubborn over your culture and the values that you wanted? Is there opportunity to take that away?
Speaker C: I think so. I mean, uh, you know, I'm hard headed and stubborn about people doing the right thing and about people, you know, operating with the utmost of, you know, integrity and honesty. And you know, we like, we want to push the limits. We're here to win and make money and the economic propositions why the business exists. But like we have to do things great, we have to do things better. We got to push the envelope to make sure our franchisees are happy and times are good and time, there's tough times and big years and not as good years like okay, fine, I've seen a lot over the 22 years I've done this, but the constant is making sure that you're trying to adjust, evolve and make the franchisees lives better.
Speaker B: So we're going to end on a fun note. I can't, I can't let this go until really, I know everyone wants to know. Everyone wants to know this question. So what's your go to Slim Chickens order?
Speaker C: I get a Slim split. I get cayenne ranch, honey mustard and a Slim Sauce, all three. And I also get a club sandwich. I get it just to make sure the build looks right and I tell myself I'm not going to eat it, but I usually do eat both. So there's my order.
Speaker B: Thank you so much Tom. That was awesome.
Speaker C: That was great. Thank you.
Speaker B: And thank you listeners for tuning into our conversation with Slim Chickens co Founder and CEO Tom Gordon. Tom's insights really shows how the right tech can help a business move forward. With Paycom's tools, you'll bring efficiency to your work, allowing you to focus on your strategic goals as you're looking for new employees. Paycom's talent acquisition tools streamline the recruiting, hiring and onboarding processes to keep the top talent you want from falling through the cracks as you work to help those new hires become seasoned parts of the team. Performance management software gives you the tools to conduct two way conversations and track the development of your employees. When it comes to scheduling time off requests, featuring Gone reduces the administrative burden of managing time off requests and helps you meet your scheduling needs by automating the time off request process based on guidelines that you set. You can learn all about that and more by visiting us@paycom.com we hope you return to the HR break room very soon.
Speaker A: Be sure to follow and subscribe to HR Break Room on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen. For more episodes, visit hrbreakroom.com or follow us on social media. Thanks for tuning in to this episode and we can't wait for you to join us again inside the HR Break Room.
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