Shannon Shafer

I had a really great manager named Kirk Sylos who worked with me when I first started at the same space that I am in now, as a server and bartender. He really just took me under his wing and said, if you want to learn things, I'll teach you things, this is how we do this. Anytime that I had a question, instead of being frustrated or having a 'you should know this already' kind of attitude, he really went through the process of just making sure that I understood and that I was making something out of what I was being told. He was very much a believer that you can't tell someone to do something, you have to tell somebody why it's important that they do those things. He was definitely a huge role in helping me become the leader that I am today.

This is going to sound funny, but it's not rocket science. We are providing a service to a guest every day, and all we have to do is solve a problem with a smile on our face. Most of the time, people are going to come around, and that was a pivotal moment when someone said that to me. They said it's not rocket science, it's just serving food. We just have to get it done and get it out there. So just not taking yourself too seriously - it's not as hard as it seems, we can do this.

I would say you just kind of have to have a strong backbone. You have to say what you feel and what you're seeing, when there's maybe things that aren't going the way you think is right. You need to bring it up to the people that are in charge or to other people around, because things - you just have to make what's wrong go away, right? We have to fix the problem. We can't just sit there and let it be a problem and kind of ignore it. So I would just say, keep going. Don't ever think that you don't have a voice, because you always have a voice for someone, and encouraging each other is so important. Being a part of a group that can really back each other up is always great.

Right now, we've seen a huge decrease, honestly, nationwide, of how much people are spending on weddings. So it's definitely something that - our venue is very large, so it was made to do events of 200, 250 people. The challenge that we've had is just how do we make it appealing and affordable to young ladies who are wanting to get married and not wanting to spend their whole life savings on it. That's been something that's definitely been a challenge for us, just changing with the times and understanding how people are looking at weddings. They're looking at much more experience-based weddings versus this big show that they're putting on for everyone else. It's more of, hey, I want to have the people that I really care about have a really cool experience, but I don't need it to be something that makes it so I can't buy a house later. So it's been a challenge, but we definitely have been working to figure out how we can partner with other vendors and things like that to reduce costs associated just with our venue in general.

Family, obviously, for me, is big first. It's always the most important part, and teaching my daughter how to be a leader. I think leadership is another big thing for me, just knowing that you, no matter what you're doing or the position that you're in, you have influence on somebody, and making sure that you're being honest and truthful while you're in your work environment. People really notice that, they take hold of that, and then they continue to live by example.