#037 - Hospitality Meets Mary Jane Flanagan - The All-Round Inspirer

When we started the podcast, we wanted to tell the stories and journeys of the people of hospitality but we also wanted to shout from the rooftops about anything incredible that people are doing.Mary Jane Flanagan (MJ), founder of MJ Inspire (www.mjinspire.com) fits into both categories effortlessly as not only does she have a really interesting journey, she's doing an incredible body of work to support job seekers at a time when they need it the most. Bravo MJ!!!There's a lot crammed into our chat and that includes, positive greetings, country house hotels, left field opportunities, business evolution, the importance of travel, attitude over skill, Pre-battle pep talks, Winning or learning, Adding value, Job Seekers toolkit, careers advice, psychology, being a morning person, When it’s OK to kiss the health inspector and a massive dose of Fun.It's a cracker, as always there's some brilliant anecdotes as well.Enjoy!Show Transcription MJWed, 9/30 10:51AM • 1:07:15SUMMARY KEYWORDShospitality, people, MJ, restaurants, cv, running, industry, buy, skills, job, inspire, feeling, brilliant, business, psychology, interview, thought, stories, personSPEAKERSPhil Street, MJPhil Street 00:01Welcome to hospitality meets with me Phil street where we take a light hearted look into the stories and individuals that make up the wonderful world of hospitality. Today's guest is the inspirational managing Flanagan, creative director and founder of MJ inspire limited. Coming up on today's show. MJ talks us through some tough, tough learning.MJ 00:22What do you mean? You don't know? I could be running a BrothelPhil Street 00:25Phil reveals one of his more repeatable nicknames. I got the Mickey taken out of me me relentlessly for it because they used to just call me Mr. Disney. And MJ tells us the lengths you'll go to to get a good environmental report.MJ 00:38And the chefs are looking at my dad, and they're looking at me. And they said, Why did you just kiss the health inspector,Phil Street 00:43all that and so much more as MJ talks us through her story and journey to date, as well as the incredible and inspiring work she's doing through lockdown to help job seekers at this tough time. In addition, look out for the many wonderful nuggets of wisdom from MJ, And dare I say it from myself. Not to be missed? Don't forget, we launched a brand new episode each week telling the amazing and always amusing stories from hospitality. So make sure you hit that subscribe button and give us a like and share across your networks. Let's share these stories as far as we can. Enjoy. Hello, and welcome to the next edition of hospitality meets with me Phil Street. One of the objectives of the show when I started this was not only to tell the amazing stories and journeys of the wonderful people that exist within hospitality, but also to shout loudly about anyone incredible that that comes along any new ideas, innovations, and that sort of thing. Today, my guest easily fits into both categories and so I'm delighted to welcome to the show, the founder and creative director behind MJ inspire Mary Jane Mary Jane Flanagan should get that right. Welcome to the show.MJ 01:48Hi, hi, Phil. Let's make it easy. Call me MJ.Phil Street 01:52I thought everybody calls you MJ don't they?MJ 01:55They do.Phil Street 01:56Thank you know that is much, much easier, especially at 9.21 in the morning when the coffee has not quite kicked in yet.MJ 02:03Or midnight when the club you're running is slammed.Phil Street 02:06Yeah,MJ 02:06Then I'm just MJ.Phil Street 02:08Yeah. I bet. Yeah. So how are you anyway? How's things?MJ 02:12Do you know? Well, I'm marvellous as I always say to people, I'm very lucky. lockdown is tough. But I've had a huge learning curve. I've got a back garden. I have a running tap of frozen watermelon Margarita is so life could be a lot worse.Phil Street 02:31You know the the great thing about your reaction there when you said marvellous is that I remember way back when I still worked in in kind of operations and things is that I absolutely conditioned myself to no matter how I was feeling to just say wonderful. And when people asked me how we were and that was we always used to got the Mickey taken over me relentlessly for it because they used to just call me Mr. Disney as a result of it.MJ 03:00Boom, I'm exactly the same. Yeah. People don't need to hear in hospitality out our issues or our problems. They're with us to have a good time.Phil Street 03:09Yep. Absolutely. And actually, it's just a little moment of joy you can give someone by if if they're feeling a bit down and you just impart this exuberance and positivity then it plays its part and impacting them.MJ 03:24It certainly does. It certainly does. And actually, if you say enough during the day, you end up feeling it anyway.Phil Street 03:30Yep, absolutely. It's the same old thing about the psychology around, you know, when you give somebody a smile.MJ 03:37Yeah.Phil Street 03:37You know they take it with them. I don't know what the actual cliché is, but it's something along those lines.MJ 03:42No, no, it is and their brain is conditioned to smile back. It's part of our DNA. And before you know it, they're smiling naturally. Yeah. I love that one. Don't probably need it more than others.Phil Street 03:53Yeah, absolutely. I love that. We're two minutes and 47 seconds in and we're already talking psychology.MJ 03:59Yes.Phil Street 04:01So just give us a quick snapshot if you would of what you you do under the banner of MJ inspire. MJ 04:09Okay, so company formed in 2016. And mission is to help organisations and individuals be the best that they can possibly be through strategy, learning and development, and of course, inspiration. Yeah. And it can be coaching one to ones it can be working on the strategy of mainboards opening new hotels, running conferences, the I ran the Chewton Glen iconic hotels conference, about a month before lockdown. Wow, the two days with sir Clive Woodward. I mean, that was fantastic.Phil Street 04:49That sounds amazing.MJ 04:50It really was, God I get to speak with some amazing speakers.Phil Street 04:54Yeah. Got put me on your invite list for future events.MJ 04:58Yeah, definitely. And Chewton Glen is always a joy. It's my happy place.Phil Street 05:03Yeah, I've never actually been it's, it's on the hit list for sure.MJ 05:08I thoroughly recommend it. It's not stuffy. It's relaxed, very, very chilled. And the food and the wine are superb.Phil Street 05:17Yeah, I know. It's sort of benchmarking how to do Country House Hotel.MJ 05:24Yeah. But to be fair, you know, Cliveden, Whatley. Hey, I love The Pig. Yeah, they're all just, you know, they do what we do best. They make us feel fantastic. Yeah.Phil Street 05:37Yeah. And that's your that's hospitality in a nutshell, right there, isn't it?MJ 05:41Yeah, absolutely.Phil Street 05:43Well, thanks for coming on the show.MJ 05:45Nice to be here. I'll just start quickly that I don't just work with hospitality. I've got global it clients, banking firms, a national veterinary hospital chain, and my current clients, of course.Phil Street 05:59Yeah. Well, I know they can all do with inspiration, I'm sure. Exactly. Great stuff. Okay. So before we get on to kind of talking about the the excellent work that you've done, I suppose as a result of the situation that we find ourselves in, I want to want to go all the way back to the beginning. And I'd love you to walk us through your journey and to how you've ended up doing what you're doing.MJ 06:25Okay, okay. And I've got a few funny stories in and tries to get too long. You know, why do they and in 1973 So, parents bought a guesthouse in Brighton when I was 12. So you could say I grew up in the industry of waitressing on Brighton seafront, and from there decided to study hospitality in Huddersfield. And then on graduation, had to come back to London and find a job. Yeah. And I was thinking about this this morning, because back then, I'm very old, didn't have the internet. You know, I was in the Huddersfield library, looking at the caterer or the grocer, trying to get informationPhil Street 07:09my life. I remember thatMJ 07:11I remember one of the jobs I applied for, for a salary assistant...