It's Not All About Coffee... With Tim Porter

It's hard to ignore Tim. Even as a behind-the-scenes kind of man his presence is very much felt throughout everything that happens at Rosetta. Not just because he runs operations, but, because... he cares. In this installment of It's Not All About The Coffee we take a seat with the man that keeps a lot of the day-to-day hustling and bustling clocking over in each of our stores — without much ado, let's get right into it.... *drumroll*... 

ROSETTA: Introduce yourself to us and tell us what you do at Rosetta / how long have you been working there? 

TIM: My name's Timothy Porter, and I've been with Rosetta for just over three years now. I wear a couple of different hats when it comes to working with Rosetta — I generally oversee the operations for our cafe's, staff training and client training (there's an HR and administrative role that goes along with that). Yes, well, operations, I guess. 

ROSETTA: What are some of the best things about being a part of the Rosetta team? 

TIM: I have several reasons why being a part of Rosetta is rad and awesome, and I love coming to work every day — but, to name a few — firstly, the approach that has been taken from ownership level that the team is always in the loop, lots of clear communication, making sure nothing is hidden and that if you have any questions about any part of the business, to an extent, you're able to learn and grow. There's just so much knowledge transfer, and I love that openness! I love how that creates and fosters a great team culture. 

In terms of standards and levels in our cafes, the second reason would be that every one of our baristas and team members executes at a high level. We realize the importance of being judged at our weakest link so we spend time to ensure that the team, in general, can execute and communicate to a high standard and give a good experience — it's key. Whether you go to one store or the other, no matter who you're dealing with, you'll get great coffee, great communication and customer experience and our team do that really well! 

Thirdly, specifically looking at the females on our team, we have incredible cultural diversity. Then, to have three outstanding female staff members who push the boundaries and who (we consider) to be leading the way in the industry is so awesome. Essentially all three of them have shone and found themselves in leadership positions within Rosetta. You don't see that often, and it's great! 

ROSETTA: Do you have any other passions, side gigs, hobbies and what are they? 

TIM: Side gigs? Well definitely, a big passion of mine is sport. Playing sport, watching sport. In the last few years, I've gotten into surfing and love getting out into the water as often as I can. 

Then, just recently during COVID, there has been a lot of community-oriented stuff happening around Muizenberg, where I live. I want to see that grow and get involved in that on a community level. How I engage and how we engage with our community is important to us as a family. 

ROSETTA: Has the pursuit of excellence in one passion helped you to pursue excellence in another? And if so, how so? 

TIM: I guess there has to be a lot of interrogating and questioning in the pursuit of excellence. You know? Not just accepting the status quo and what you see before you, but really doing the research and the hard yards to reach excellence. I can translate that into many areas of my life where I haven't just accepted what I was told or followed the status quo. I've interrogated and asked questions. Out of that, excellence comes.