Age: 55

Title: Senior vice president, director

Organization: TS Restaurants, which operates Kimo's, Leilani's on the Beach and Hula Grill on Maui; Duke's Canoe Club and Keoki's Paradise on Kaua'i; Duke's Canoe Club and the newly opened Hula Grill in Waikiki; and six restaurants in California.

High school: Point Loma High School in San Diego

College: Degree in political science with a minor in anthropology from the University of California at Santa Barbara

Breakthrough job: "It probably would have to be when we opened our Kimo's restaurant in Lahaina in 1977. I kind of went from the staff side of things to managing people and it was a breakthrough restaurant for Maui. Maui was going through some great changes, from a sleepy little plantation-type town with an economy based in agriculture — sugarcane and pineapple. And then the tourism was just starting to hit back then, so we were kind of one of the leading new businesses that were going to take care of the visitors and the residents in a new way, in a more professional but really aloha-filled way. And just learning the business from (the late) Rob Thibaut, my mentor and best friend, and being in charge of about 100 people ... to be a part of that beginning was great."

Q. How did you start off in the restaurant business?

A. My senior year (of college) I went up early to a Chart House in Santa Barbara. I went up about a month early and got involved with the opening. At that point it was the No. 6 Chart House and I just thought those guys were so cool because they all surfed, from the owners to the dishwashers. And their feet were tan, which was a good sign. And we just enjoyed their spirit of aloha. That's when I got caught with the restaurant business. ... (I came to Kimo's) from the Chart House in Lahaina.

Q. What are the biggest challenges you face as a manager?

A. The biggest challenge is just always going to be getting the best out of your people and striving for quality all of the time, whether it's a quality building or the best possible, freshest piece of fish cooked perfectly and then served perfectly. And training your employees and to be true aloha spirit hospitalitarians. And living hospitality, and making sure that the experience is the best it can possibly be for our guests — and that's a nightly challenge. And what happens is you create expectations and you have to exceed them the next day. that's probably the biggest challenge.

Q. How do you exercise your philosophy that business is a team sport?

A. We always want to be coaches, not judges, and it really flows to organizing a team. And what we want to do is train everyone for their positions, their role, make those roles apparent, clear, and that everyone is important on that team. And so we make sure that the greeter or the hostess feels just as important as the people serving the customers, just as important as the bartender. That the chefs in the back and the line cooks feel important in their role as well as the dishwashers — you're not going to serve many dinners if you don't have plates. So everyone's involved. We have meetings, we talk about it and we care for each other and we have what we call a respect for the individual in our restaurants. And we exercise that. From the ownership we have to respect our managers. Our managers respect each other. One of our passions is our pride in our employees. We have respect for our employees. And if everybody does that then it really flows right down to our guests.

Q. What do you mean by respect for the individual?

A. We ask them to exercise their value system here. We work on integrity, honesty, hard work, humility.

Q. What are the most important lessons when you're teaching managers how to run a successful restaurant?

A. Be honest, be consistent, it's OK to make a mistake. Try not to repeat it. One sign of success is defined by making good decisions. Good decisions are usually a product of experience. Experience is usually a product of bad decisions that we've righted.

Q. What's an example of creating a sense of place in a sensitive culture or location?

A. First of all, we enjoy being in rather spectacular locations. That makes it a little bit easier. When you're oceanfront Hawai'i, that creates a sense of place all by itself. And then we do it through architecture. And we try to reflect the culture of the surrounding environment. (Hula Grill in Waikiki) reflects a turn-of-the-18th- to 19th-century old plantation home ... We have elements of hula and all of the culture that is perhaps being replaced by the new culture. And we want to preserve those histories, through art, artifacts and even dance and music. So we preserve our sense of place through our music and our entertainment. And then the people that we have here live here and they reflect the culture. ... We really think that Waikiki is a really important place in Hawai'i. We're really proud to be part of the changes here, with the re-beautification of Waikiki.

Q. What are the biggest differences between operating restaurants in California and operating restaurants in Hawai'i?

A. First of all, Hawai'i has a more definite culture throughout the whole state. California has a little bit more of a mixed bag. The Lake Tahoe mountain culture is a lot different than the Southern California beach culture. But I think one of the biggest differences in Hawai'i from California is people are mostly on vacation here and we're dealing with a lot higher visitor-to-resident ratio. And in California that's sort of reflected in these pesky little things they have over there that we don't have — they're called Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. Our business can be strong seven nights a week where in California it builds throughout the week. California goes head-to-head with the Hawaiian restaurants on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, but they have to slow down and build in the early part of next week.

Q. Which of your restaurants is the most successful?