“The cleaning staff prepared my lunch today.”
It might sound like an unusual sentence, but if you know someone who works at Verdo, you might have heard it before.
Dorthe Dahl Ohlsen, kitchen manager at our canteen at Verdo, dreamed of refreshing the menu and serving an authentic Thai lunch. For that, she needed a little help from her colleagues in the cleaning team.
“We have three women with Thai roots in our cleaning team, so I asked if one of them might be interested in teaching us in the kitchen how to make authentic Thai food. Natt was up for it,” Dorthe explains.
After coordinating with customer manager Thorkild Vestergaard, Natt put on an apron and kicked off her three days as a guest chef by taking Dorthe on a shopping trip to Asian supermarkets.
“Soy sauce, ginger, and chili alone won’t make it taste truly authentic. It just won’t be the same,” Dorthe says, revealing Natt’s secret ingredient for a great Pad Thai:
“Natt introduced me to tamarind paste. That’s something I’ll definitely use again!”
For Natt, the experience was equally exciting and educational.
“I’ve never cooked this much before, so it was fascinating to see how a large kitchen operates. Everyone was so kind and interested in how I prepared the food, so I would definitely do it again,” says Natt.
The kitchen team’s pantry isn’t the only thing that’s been upgraded thanks to Dorthe’s initiative.
“This has definitely improved our collaboration. Natt and her two colleagues, Uma and Phen, were really enthusiastic about it, and all three were proud that Natt got to cook something meaningful to them,” Dorthe says.
Where the kitchen and cleaning teams previously exchanged only quick good mornings, they now share breakfast every Friday and talk and assist each other throughout the week.
The guest chef initiative has fostered a real “one team” spirit, and Dorthe highly recommends other canteens try something similar.
“Our canteen guests thought it was amazing, and for us, it was fun to try something new while also building closer relationships with our colleagues,” says Dorthe.
In December, Dorthe and Natt received the cleaning division’s “Flower of the Month” award for creating synergy and leading by example in customer and service understanding through this initiative.
Bravo, Dorthe and Natt – and thank you for setting a shining example of teamwork across professions!