Recipe for Success

By Suzanne Carawan

Chef Marti Mongiello started his career with a “no.”

Upon graduating from high school, he took the ASVAB (Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery) exam, and despite scoring in the 95th percentile, he was denied admission to the Air Force due to trouble he got into as a teenager. This first ‘no’ did not thwart Marti’s desire to serve our country, so he began to knock on different doors until he found his yes. He signed into the United States Navy as a cook and from there, he put his head down and worked, finding himself overseeing an entire ship’s kitchen by the age of 20.

Throughout his military service, Marti focused on developing his philosophies and personal protocols of success. He was relentless in his pursuit of excellence as evidenced by being appointed chef to the Navy Admirals followed by an appointment to the White House under President Clinton. While in the service, Marti not only developed his culinary skills, but also learned six languages, became a renowned historian, and an invaluable member of the White House staff entrusted to handle caring for White House families through providing exceptional nourishment.

While food is the tangible way that Marti fed those for whom he cared, what truly transpired during his career is that Marti became far more than a chef. His recipes began to morph from food to business as he took on new entrepreneurial adventures utilizing the same recipe of hard work, determination and discipline, that had led him to peak performance in the kitchen. As Marti continued to find business success, he found himself increasingly sought after to provide “entrepreneurial nourishment” by providing inspiration, imagination and innovation to businesspeople looking to go to the next level.

Marti’s recipe for entrepreneurial success is founded on several key ingredients, including:

1. Salivate for the No to Savor the Yes

A fire was lit in Marti’s belly the day he received his first ‘no’. The fire grew as Marti realized that receiving the answer of ‘no’ did two things for him — first, it allowed him to discern how determined he was in achieving his goal, and secondly, it allowed him to stop wasting time and seek the person who would say yes. Marti preaches “the nine no’s,” which means you need to keep asking nine times until you get to the yes on the tenth try. Marti quickly understood that being an entrepreneur was a numbers game and his success banked on accumulating the right clientele. Each prospective client who said no allowed Marti to redouble his efforts on new prospects who would say yes. From the military, Marti learned how finite his energy stores were and focused on optimization of his time and effort. This methodology allowed him to focus on “racking and stacking appointments” and salivating to get to the no as quickly as possible, so he could identify the clients who valued his service and provided the yes.

2. Small Plates Make Big Impressions

An avid reader, Marti often turns to the work from the American Psychological Association for guidance. One of the key pieces of advice that has helped him create sales spikes in his business is the creation of small, intrinsic gifts for prospects and clients. Marti has become a master at getting to know his prospects and clients — he keeps incredibly detailed spreadsheets on each one — because he knows that it takes at least five interactions to make a long-lasting impression. Marti focuses on creating a small plate of food, finding a book, or selecting a quote that he knows a client or prospect would appreciate and delivering it without any ask attached. He focuses, instead, on creating a gift experience for his prospect or client that uses five words as the Litmus test for whether it will be successful: “super, highercharged, high octane.” If the gift can deliver, Marti can reliably see his close rate double and credits this ingredient to how he’s taken his business sales into the stratosphere.

3. Be Battle Mechanized (No One Wings Dinner at the White House) Marti’s third ingredient is straight from his military training and focuses on the ability to be incredibly organized and have a master plan. While he focuses on five interactions to make an impression, he’s found that he needs 60 touchpoints to create a client for life. Marti is a master at building target profiles for each prospect and in-depth profiles for each client. He takes an integrated marketing approach to