From Dishwasher to Michelin-Trained Private Chef

for getting rich quick or the new fat on how to make money.

And it's just a tried true formula. You just come great at something and eventually you'll make it.

“So that's what I want people to take away, especially.”

William Lawrence is a Michelin train chef, entrepreneur, and the founder of Lawrence Food Group. He creates exceptional dining experiences through world-class cuisine, personalized hospitality, and a commitment to excellence that transforms every meal

into a lasting memory. I experience in these fine dining restaurants, as well as working in the homes of some of the wealthiest people in the world. It's really put us in a unique niche

we can offer our services to some of the most distinguished people in the world. What do you have to say to the young guy out there, the young entrepreneur who's like, "I really don't know what to lock in on,

"know yourself, know what your habits are, "know what you lack at, know what you are good at." And then when you know you're good at, like double down, double down, because... (dramatic music)

- It spans the globe. Like a super high school. - Internet Elvis? - Ready? - All right.

- Today, Apple is going to reinvent football. - It's not over, I'm telling how we're... - The living your legacy podcast. For those who live, to leave a legacy. (upbeat music)

- Welcome back everybody to another episode of the Living Your Legacy Podcast. I am here today with Will Lawrence, out in New York, Will Learn to the Show. Thank you, brother, I appreciate it.

- Pleasure being here, I'm joined the weather. - Pleasure having you put a little hot, a little bit. But the humidity kind of...

“I think humidity heat is better than dry.”

You've been out to Arizona, Nevada.

- I've never been, but I've been in Florida on some days

when it's very dry, and you're right, I do prefer it. You know what's gonna rain, and at one point, then you got a cool, nice smell there. - I can smell it in the air when it's about to rain, which people think I'm crazy when I say it.

- But I don't believe it, man, I believe it. Because, because when you're out here, you know, whenever I'm with his family or anything, they know off the bat, they're like, it's probably gonna rain a few minutes.

I'm like, it's beautiful out there, right? - Yeah, it would be like, not a cloud in the sky, and you can tell, you're like, give it 15 minutes. - Yeah, and you get types of rain here, like you don't see in New York,

you'll get the rain in on across the street, but it's dry here, when you get like a misty rain, but it doesn't even feel like it's rain. - Sun showers, the whole night is beautiful, man. - So we're about to go into filming your episode

of Legacy Makers. Now, I ask this of everybody that comes on the show. When people see your episode, what's like the number one lesson you want them to be able to take away from your story? - The number one lesson I want people to take

from my personal journey is that, you know, it sounds cliche, but if you put your mind to something, you can do it, you know, no matter what your upbringing is, no matter what you think, your set trajectory should be. If you find something you love and most importantly,

you dedicate the time and the discipline to become a leader

in that craft, and that's amazing.

You'll make it, it's really a simple formula. It's very rare that people dedicate a decade into something, become great at it, and don't succeed, you know, and I feel like so many people out there trying to find

the recipe for getting rich quick or the new fat on how to make money, and it's just a tried true formula. You just become great at something, and eventually you'll make it.

“You know, so that's what I want people to take away,”

especially for people that are young, 'cause I feel like that was my superpower. I found out what I wanted to do and a fairly early age. And when you're in your mid-30s, and you have more than a decade experience

in something, it really sets you apart from a lot of people, because most people are finding out what they want to do in their 30s, you know? So I'm in the same position. I'm in the same boat.

I'm a decade into filmmaking now, and I look around, and I see a lot of people in kind of my same age room, I'm 33 now. So like, I'm 35. Yeah, so we're right there in the same age bracket.

I look around to my left of my right, and I see a lot of people pivoting. What do you have to say to the young guy out there, the young entrepreneur, who's like, I really don't know what to lock in on?

What's the advice in that arena? Well, when you're young, you know, thankfully you have the gift of time, right? So as long as you're going into something with the right intention and only you know

if you're doing that, if you're going into something, because you just know there's money there, you don't really like it, or because somebody told you to do it,

But if you genuinely like what you're doing, there's skill sets in that area that you believe will make you better at what you do, and let's say go for it.

“And then if you need to pivot, you have time on your side,”

but at least you were able to scoop up a lot of relative skill sets that can transfer it to maybe the thing you want to do.

Yeah, there's always like overlapping skill sets.

Like if you, I tell people too, like if you're just looking for money and you're young, get into hospitality, like you're so, I think everybody should work in the service industry. At least lessons, you can take from that.

You realize that from the dishwasher to the head chef to the GM, everybody's role is like pivoting to the whole game. You know, if you've ever worked in restaurants and the dishwasher calls out, you know for sure. Always, you're back to play to hell that night.

It seems like such an easy thing, and you think they're low skilled labor, but they don't show up. Yeah, but then you want to serve food, you ain't got no plates. Exactly.

And now my manager is back there washing dishes. You know what I mean? And even if it's the corporate world,

like if you go into the corporate world

“with that understanding that the guy who claims the toilets”

to my boss, everybody has a space here that makes this train go, that's a good way to come in, 'cause a lot of people don't think that way. Especially people I know in corporate fields, I talk to them sometimes about hospitality

and how we resolve conflicts, how you get reprimanded, or something goes wrong. And it's like miles away from the corporate life. It's very, you know, structured, sometimes it's very, almost fake, but when you're dealing with hospitality,

it's like your actions produce results instantly. So if you're not doing what you're supposed to do, you don't find out six months from now in an email, you find out today, you know? So I do think hospitality is a good way for anybody who's young

to just get in and you're guaranteed to leave with skills that will transfer to many much any other career. - Yep, I'm 100%, I agree with you 100%. Now, I want to just kind of, you brought up the hospitality industry.

I wanna just get a sense for your trajectory of like, when I got into the workforce, I started off as a mechanic. Oh, wow, I loved working on cars, right? But then I looked to my left of my right

and I saw, you know, the shop foreman, the master mechanic at like 50, 60, they got the carpal tunnel in the hands, can't play catch with their kids. I was like, that's not the future that I want from myself. And you pivot, like I pivoted into the restaurant

as you have bartender for like four years,

and then finally I found a camera in my hands

and I was like, that's the thing. But what was your trajectory? - I got into the hospitality industry when I was 14. And it was out of pure necessity. I needed a job, the quickest place,

I could find the job is the local restaurant. You know, so I worked there as a bus boy, slash dishwasher, slash delivering, you know, food orders. And I liked it, you know, it was decent money. I was able to balance it with school,

but it was just a job at that point and I had no idea what I wanted to do. As I progressed through high schools, same thing bounced to the for restaurants became like lead captain waiter at a big catering hall

doing weddings and things like that. And like so many kids, you get pressured,

“you need to go to college, you need to go to college.”

At that point, I didn't know I wanted to be a successful chef. I knew I was good in this industry who I didn't have something solid to tell my mom, like, hey, this is the right I wanna go. So I went to school.

Completely wasted a year at school. It was like the most expensive hotel I've ever been to. - Yeah. - At that point. And still while I'm in school, I'm working at some restaurants,

trying to work at like the school cafeteria 'cause that's just what I was drawn to. And once I left that one year, pretty much flunking out, I got back into working into restaurants at this time, you know, since there was no school

and doing full-time double shifts. And in between shifts, I would hang out with the kitchen guys. It was at that point I was still a waiter. And while I'm still a batch and back to house, the best people, oh yeah, exactly.

Like when I'm in between shifts, everybody out front was super dry. Go in the back, you know, it's like a pirate ship crew, you know, you're like, you're cursing, you're telling, you know, as you joke, you know, most of them are Hispanics

or we're speaking Spanish back there, just, you know, live in life. And then they would eventually tell me, hey, if you're gonna be back here, fucking do something. So then I started chopping onions, doing things like that. The restaurant I worked that was actually pretty cool

with me wanting to try things. So they would sneak in a little shift of me actually, being a cook so I can feel it out. And then I started, oh my life, I was very much until I watched her food network,

watching these things. So I, I said to myself, hey, let me take a tour of a culinary school. Just see what it's like. And then when I went into the French culinary institute, now they merged with another school in Manhattan.

right in smack dab, so ho in New York. You go inside, you see these kitchens, you see this bright white tiles on the walls, on the floors, shiny stainless steel, everybody in their dress whites, it just looked so sick.

And seeing the, the confidence and the respect that the chefs commanded from everybody else,

I finally looked at it and I was like, oh man,

I don't, I don't think I want to be a doctor or a lawyer or this, but I was like, but that guy, like that,

“I think I can do that, and then the way everybody's following”

them, become confident he is. Yes, chef. You know what I mean, exactly. And you know, this is, this is probably almost 20 years ago, like, 16 years ago, 17 years ago.

So, I mean, it's really cool now to be a chef and all this up at that time, it's still was like, you know, tell somebody, I work in a kitchen or I'm a chef. They just think you're a cook. Now in days, you tell somebody you're a chef.

People actually have something that they can reference to, like the bear or yeah, or according to Rams, you know, this is so that it's so much more prevalent in media nowadays, so that's the cool, you know, but back then it wasn't, but when I saw that, I was like, yeah, I think,

I think this is what I want to do. I just, I just felt the first time I was ever somewhere, it was just like, yeah, like this is it, and everything was pointing me towards this. And, you know, I enrolled there while I was there,

got some amazing jobs from some restaurants in the city, one that I'm working at one of the best restaurants through our ranked restaurants in the world. And then that led me to my journey of being a private chef to a bunch of different celebrities.

I'm going to eventually open up my own company. Now, it's funny, 'cause I tell people all the time, I love food, loved my time in the restaurant industry,

and I was working the bar, but I would always be back

in the kitchen with the chefs, like those were my guys. And especially 'cause the restaurant that I was working at, the head chef was Jamaican, I'm Jamaican. We're back there speaking pattoa. Nobody knows what the hell we're talking about,

'cause it was at what a time to be alive. But I always told people, if I had never picked up a camera, I would've become a chef, 'cause I love cooking like that. And when my family knows, like, if I'm in the kitchen, I'm throwing down.

When you kind of got your first feel for becoming a chef at a professional level,

“what was kind of like that bulb click moment for you?”

- So, I mean, I progress kind of quickly, because of the route I had and just the opportunities that presented themselves, I was very much, I'm very much the type of person that even if I think I don't have the qualification to do something

or I'm a little nervous about maybe this is too much for me. I'm like, we'll figure it out later, you know, like, let's just do it. The first step is doing it, and then I'll know if I can really do it.

So, my first executive chef position was actually at a restaurant in Westchester County in New York. And a gentleman was opening up a restaurant. He had a partner that was loosely friends with people of my family.

And, you know, the highest position I had up into that point was like, "Such chef at a restaurant." This guy needed the executive chef to come in and start a restaurant from scratch, you know, develop menus, all these things.

And I was like, "Yeah, let's do it." So, I was really a part of starting a space from ground level and at, you know, at our peak, we were doing 250 people for dinner while we're doing another wedding for 300.

While we might be doing a suit 16 downstairs for like 75 people, and it's all coming out of one kitchen. So, it was really like trial. Big was the kitchen. Oh, it was insane, it was huge.

Oh, it was huge. We had two part, three party rooms, full dining room. It was, yeah, it was very, very ambitious of them. And it was the first time these owners also had a place

that big. So, at the same time, it's, you know, it's not like they had a huge, you know, financing behind it. So, some weeks, you know, they're struggling for change on a playful, pay for orders.

There's other weeks where the delivery driver might come and he didn't get paid. So, he leaves with all my stuff. So, like, I'm dealing with, you know, running that and dealing with all the extra stuff,

like those logistics stuff that, you know, that make it 10 times more difficult. So, it was cool, but I had no frame of reference because this was my first job as an executive chef. So, in my mind, it's like, this is what everybody goes through,

which, this is also another reason why I like just willing myself to do something new because when it becomes so difficult, and then you get your next job as an executive chef

where everything's right, the money's always there.

“Everybody's always on time, you know what I'm like?”

Oh, crap, like, oh, what does it do with my eyes closed? Yeah, you've already gone through the fire.

if I was, if my first job was perfect,

and then I go to a place like this, I wouldn't know where to begin, but because I had no frame of reference, it was soon, this is normal. I need to just go with the flow

and do what I gotta do. As we sort of, guys, I want to make sure, if you're still tuning in at this point, make sure that you check out Will's episode of Legacy Makers, 'cause we're gonna do a much deeper dive

into his story, much deeper dive into, you know, his background of what his current offer is in his business today, but I want to ask, you know, we're here at Inside Success, and one of my, one of my number one questions that I ask, all of my guests is for the entrepreneur out there,

the business owner, the aspiring entrepreneur, what would be like, and all we talked a little bit about, just kind of like perseverance and being able to push through, but what would you say is like your number one key tip for success?

It's, you know, there's so many things that'll stick to different people. And I've learned this through managing, you know, so many different personalities. Some people really need a stern talk into.

They need that David Goggins, pickin' the ass, get the F up, no, you know, little bitch, you know, stuff like that, so some of them, some kitchen's need a gorgeous, yeah, exactly. And then there's other people that,

they don't respond well to that at all. They need, you to lift them up. They need you to speak to them in a different way. And you, you just need to realize the type of person who are and be honest with yourself, right?

“So you need to know, am I somebody who keeps everything”

to last minute and then I cram before? Like, okay, you know that's your personality. We need to work on planning ahead. If you know you're the type of person that you don't excel in this one thing,

but there's some adjacent skills that you can be amazing at, like, you really need to get up on that. So I feel like it, you really need to just know yourself, know what your habits are, know what you've,

what you lack at, know what you are good at. And then when you know you're good at, like, double down, double down, because the bigger separation you can have between the next competitor, the better.

So and all of us are, you know, we feel a pull of gravitation to something, you know, it might be, you might not know exactly, but maybe it's people. And if it's something people didn't work around people,

and who knows, it might become a consultant later on that puts people together and you're making millions.

You never know where these skills will take you.

So just know yourself and figure out what you're good at and just keep doubling down. - I'm a huge believer in that. Just double down on the things that, and the knowing yourself part too,

I think is super important for people 'cause I feel like not enough people take the time, or even are allowed the time. Maybe not to take the time, but a lot of people aren't allowed the time

because of the pressure of being in a difficult situation to sit down and just have a moment of silence and journal, or figure out like, hey, who is me, and what do I want? - Yeah, you need that.

- What kind of person am I? - Any of that time. - If you're listening, or if you're watching this episode, like take time away to just be like by yourself for a period of time.

“I think COVID did that for a lot of people,”

and it gave so many business owners that it gave them like a hard reset because they had time to just sit and figure out exactly who they were, and then they went and they attacked

and they double down on what their skill sets were, and now they're hugely successful business owner. Like COVID is really the reason I even got started, like, in film as opposed to like, I just wanted to mess around with cameras,

so I was doing photography for a long while.

And then COVID hit, and I bought my first cinema camera,

and I was like, well, I hang out and I don't know to do what play with this, so, yeah. And that's what it was. - That a lot from people. They have like when it comes to COVID,

obviously barring that, you know, your family's healthy, and you know, anything along those lines happen. But some people look at it as like, like a little gift from God, they try to,

you know, they took this hard time and saw the best in it. And like you said, they reflected, they looked inside, they took a much-needed break because, you know, the world forced them to take a break and then looser with their family,

figured out a passion, started a business. So, same thing I would tell them before there's so many things that can happen, but you can, you can take the good in anything. Whether it's the job, you don't know

if that's gonna be your career, you can take the good in that and bring it with you. - Amen, brother, amen. Guys, again, this is, if you're still tuned in at this point,

make sure you check out Will's episode, we'll be coming out shortly after this podcast episode. - It is. Will, where can people find you on social media?

“Where can they find you on the worldwide web at large?”

- So, Lawrencefoodgroup.com is our website.

as well for Instagram and most socials.

And then my personal is Chef Will Law.

“And on Instagram, we post a lot of stuff from food,”

from recipes to events.

We do a lot of events for Oscar-winning actors,

Zoom Royals, business moguls. That's pretty much where we focus now.

“Thankfully, my experience in these fine dining restaurants,”

as well as working in the homes of some of the wealthiest people in the world. It's really put us in a unique niche. - The.

“- We can offer our services to some of the most distinguished people”

in the world. I'm gonna see you at the Oscars, Dan. - I hope so. - All right. - All right.

Well, guys, this has been another incredible episode

of the Living Your Legacy Podcast. Again, I'm your host Jason Tyler. Will Lawrence in the house. We will catch you guys in the next one. (upbeat music)