Ryan Magnon spent nearly 14 years at Chick-fil-A, where he helped franchise operators nationwide optimize their operations and service delivery. Today, as Chief Operating Officer of Ithaka Hospitality Partners, he’s applying those hard-won lessons to an independent portfolio of four and five-star hotels, upscale food halls, and private clubs.
His journey offers a masterclass in translating operational excellence across industries—and reveals why the principles that made Chick-fil-A legendary are just as powerful in hotel operations.
Creating a Culture That Rallies Around a Common Cause
At the foundation of Chick-fil-A’s success is something simple: clarity of purpose.
“At the root of what they do really well is they create a culture that rallies everyone towards a common cause,” Magnon shared on the Hospitality Daily Podcast. “And that common cause for them is serving and loving others unconditionally. We are here in restaurants, but it’s about people.”
This people-first philosophy came directly from founder Truett Cathy, who used to say, “We’re not just in the chicken business, we’re in the people business.”
For Magnon, this clicked immediately. “If they had come to me with the powerful culture they had and said, ‘Hey, we sell shoes,’ I would’ve been in the shoe sales business. For me, it didn’t have to do with chicken. It had to do more with the service element of it and the culture of it.”
The hotel application: Hotels are also fundamentally in the people business. The physical product—the building, the design, the beds—matters, but it’s the service experience that creates loyalty and drives performance. Hotel operators who can articulate their purpose as clearly as Chick-fil-A articulates theirs will find it easier to attract talent, maintain standards, and create consistency across their properties.
The Non-Negotiable Pursuit of Excellence
Chick-fil-A’s second cultural pillar is uncompromising standards.
“Chick-fil-A does not compromise on their standards,” Magnon says. “They are emphatic about excellence. They might pursue perfection knowing it’s not possible and settle for excellence. But excellence is their goal. And they expect a lot out of everyone that’s in the organization.”
This creates a self-reinforcing cycle. “In turn, they give a lot to everyone in the organization. It’s a very giving culture, but a high-expectation culture. When you do that, people will then go, ‘Wow, yes, it is hard work, but if you’re aligned with creating excellence, then you don’t mind the hard work.'”
The result? Team members who wake up every day feeling energized rather than drained. “You wake up every day not feeling like you even work a day in your life. You wake up every day feeling like I am doing something amazing today.”
The hotel application: Excellence isn’t about perfection—it’s about consistent pursuit of the highest standards while supporting your team in achieving them. Hotel leaders who create this balance find that high standards don’t burn people out; they energize them. The key is ensuring leadership creates a culture that inspires people to “bust through that brick wall” rather than simply demanding they do so.
The Power of Studying The Best
One of the most revealing stories from Magnon’s time at Chick-fil-A came when he joined the drive-thru consulting team in 2016. The company asked six leaders to travel nationwide and help operators improve their drive-thru performance. There was just one problem.
“None of us had direct drive-thru experience,” Magnon recalls. “We all looked at each other and said, ‘Hey, none of us on the team were drive-thru gurus.'”
But Chick-fil-A’s response showed their commitment to doing things right. “They said, ‘Yeah, we know. We don’t care. We want you to go out and we want you to learn.’ They gave us 90 days, maybe 120—a long period of time where we were not actively consulting yet because frankly we weren’t ready to.”
The team spent months visiting restaurants across the country—studying the best performers, average operators, and those struggling. “We came back as a team and we developed our methodology based on what we learned. What’s working, what’s not working, and how do we craft that consulting methodology?”
They launched the program in 2017. Three years later, COVID hit and Chick-fil-A went 99% drive-thru. “It was just the right thing at the right time,” Magnon says.
The hotel application: Too many hotel operators deploy new initiatives without proper study or preparation. Chick-fil-A’s approach—investing time upfront to learn from diverse examples and develop a methodology before rolling anything out—is a model worth copying. Whether you’re improving housekeeping workflows, upgrading technology, or redesigning your F&B operations, taking time to study what works (and what doesn’t) will pay dividends.
Continuous Improvement as a Way of Life
Chick-fil-A’s commitment to operational excellence doesn’t stop at deployment. “They don’t just deploy something and let it run,” Magnon observes. “They deploy it and they say, ‘Hey, I think we have an opportunity to make this better. Let’s get a few people and let them go help us make that better.'”
This mindset of continuous improvement creates a learning organization where nothing is ever “finished.” There’s always another iteration, another optimization, another way to serve guests better or make operations more efficient.
The hotel application: Hotels often treat operational changes as one-and-done projects. You renovate the lobby, update the PMS, or launch a new breakfast concept, and then you move on. But the best operators—like Chick-fil-A—treat every initiative as a starting point. They gather feedback, measure results, identify opportunities for improvement, and iterate. This approach transforms operations from static procedures into dynamic systems that get better over time.
From QSR to Luxury Hotels: The Translation
Now leading operations for Ithaka Hospitality Partners’ portfolio of independent four and five-star hotels, Magnon is proving these principles work outside quick-service restaurants.
“At Ithaka Hospitality Partners, I am responsible for all operations, ensuring excellence in our independent, four and five-star hotel portfolio, upscale food hall operations, and private clubs,” he explains. His role involves “developing and leading a highly talented team to produce the best guest experiences, driving operational excellence and efficiencies.”
The fundamentals remain the same:
- Rally the team around serving others
- Maintain uncompromising standards
- Study before you implement
- Never stop improving
What changes is the application. In luxury hospitality, excellence looks different than it does in QSR, but the discipline required to achieve it is identical.
Key Takeaways for Hotel Operators
Magnon’s journey from Chick-fil-A to leading hotel operations offers several lessons:
1. Culture precedes performance. Before worrying about processes or technology, ensure your organization has clarity about why you exist and what you’re trying to achieve. If you can’t articulate this as clearly as “we’re in the people business,” start there.
2. High expectations require high support. Demanding excellence without providing resources, training, and genuine care for your team creates burnout. The two must go together.
3. Take time to study. Don’t rush into implementation. Invest time observing what works across different properties, segments, and operators. Build your methodology based on evidence, not assumptions.
4. Deploy and iterate. Launch with the understanding that version 1.0 is just the beginning. Create systems for gathering feedback and making improvements continuously.
5. Leadership drives adoption. Self-evaluate as a leader: are you creating a culture that causes people to rise up and achieve the mission? If not, changing processes won’t help.
Looking Ahead
As Magnon brings his experience to Ithaka Hospitality Partners, he’s proving that operational excellence isn’t industry-specific—it’s principle-based. The same disciplines that made Chick-fil-A legendary can transform hotel operations, if operators commit to them fully.
The question for hotel leaders isn’t whether these principles work. Chick-fil-A’s success proves they do. The question is whether you’re willing to commit to the same level of intentionality, study, and continuous improvement that excellence demands.
Ryan Magnon is Chief Operating Officer at Ithaka Hospitality Partners, where he leads operations for an independent portfolio of luxury hotels, upscale food halls, and private clubs. Prior to joining Ithaka, he spent nearly 14 years at Chick-fil-A Corporate in roles including Field Operations Executive, Senior Consultant for Drive-Thru Operations, and Senior Manager of Hospitality and Service Design. He previously served as Vice President of Quality and Operations at Capella Hotel Group, working with Horst Schulze, co-founder of The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company.
