The Celery Test

Some of you have heard of the celery test. Others might not. But what is it exactly? And how can The celery test help you make great decisions? 

Simon Sinek describes how the WHY is essential for long-lasting success in life and business in his book start with the WHY. It is a proven concept that helped many organizations, and you can apply it too. 

There is, however, a common problem that most organizations and people do. And, that is communicating their WHY. Some organization can clearly define their WHY and know exactly WHY they are doing, but WHAT they are doing doesn’t match with their WHY.

Almost all high-level managers are looking for an effective way to communicate with their audience. They believe in best practices. So, if a method works for a high-performance organization, then that same method will also work for us, right? 

Well no, best practices might work for one organization but not for all. Best practices are not always the best. And that’s because every organization works differently, and has different cultures and characteristics. 

Let’s say, for example, you own a coffee shop that sells high-quality coffee. You have been to many places and seen that each culture has a different take on coffee. So, you decided to show the world how each culture makes coffee and let them taste the coffee culture. 

Some of your friends recommended you to offer thee at your shop because not everyone likes coffee. ‘You might miss out many customers by not offering thee’. 

Another person comes up and says, ‘ cookies are a good investment, it works at my shop. I made millions through cookies.’ 

The third person says, ‘Everyone knows that salads are highly demanded right now. According to data, shops that sell salads get more customers.’

The last person says that celery is the way to a million. 

So, you listened and went to the grocery store to buy thee, cookies, salads, and celery. You have to spend lots of money at the supermarket because you believe that it will get you more sales. But the chances of getting value from all of these items are minuscule. Basically, there is no guarantee that all these products will work in your coffee shop.  

One thing is for certain. Nobody can see what you believe in when you walk into the supermarket with these items. 

All of this advice might work for them, but not always for you. The advice just doesn’t fit for you. When your WHY is focusing on serving cultural coffee, then you should focus only on things that fit with coffee.

You will spend less time and money by filtering the decisions based on your WHY. And, you are guaranteed to get value out of these decisions that you made. However, violating the celery test repeatedly will lead to deteriorating your ability to inspire your audience. 

‘It is not just WHAT or HOW you do things that matter; what matters is that WHAT and HOW you do things is consistent with your WHY’