How to Advance in a Professional Kitchen

There's more to it than Yes Chef, No Chef, and I'll Find Out, Chef.

You can’t wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a stick. — Jack London

Let’s say that your desired result is to become an Executive Chef. At the moment, perhaps you’re at the Chef de Partie or Sous Chef level, clamoring to advance.

Promotions don’t happen often and they don’t happen by accident. Hopefully the kitchen you’re in now is more challenging than the last place you worked (which should always be the case if you don’t want to stagnate). Workplace positioning is relative—you may have been the baddest bear in the woods of that former kitchen, but now you’re in a new one where you’re just a scared and hungry squirrel trying to survive.