IN MY SHOES: What It’s Like To Be A Commis Chef
After five years on the fixed-income trading floor at a NY investment bank, Judy Joo found herself in the kitchen of a Michelin-starred restaurant in London, and writes about the similarities between her two careers for The Wall Street Journal:
I have always thrived in high-stress and fast-paced environments - places where there is no time for "thank you" or "please" but always time for a commanding profanity. … It was déjà vu. I was again in a white-male-dominated, hierarchical environment - in a testosterone arena, where tempers boil like pots of water and egos are as inflated as the bills.
As on Wall Street, titles matter. At the bottom of the totem pole stand the humble commis chefs. The "analysts" of the kitchen, if you will, they work the longest hours and do tedious grunt work that no one else wants to do. …The "associate" of the kitchen is the chef de partie, who also does a lot of work but has the commis chefs to boss around. In place of a vice president, there is the junior sous chef. Senior VP parallels the sous chef, and the executive director is known as the head chef. At the top of the food chain stands the managing director - the much-feared yet highly revered executive chef. …
There are differences, of course, in the two professions. Trading floors can be heartless places, where money is often the sole motivating factor. Very few people there actually love what they do; rather, they love the lifestyle it makes possible. On the other hand, people who work in kitchens are driven purely by passion - the pure love of cooking and the satisfaction of creating something memorable.
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