The Horrible Performance Review That Set Him on the Road to CEO
John Peyton led Dine Brands, the owner of Applebee’s and IHOP, through the pandemic as a rookie chief executive. But first, he had to get the job. Here’s the path he took to get there. John Peyton took over as chief executive at Dine Brands, his first CEO job, just before the beginning of the pandemic in 2020. By Heather Haddon | Photographs by Kevin Serna for The Wall Street Journal Updated July 22, 2023 12:01 am ET My Pivot is a new Wall Street Journal feature in which executives reflect on the successes and setbacks of their careers. John Peyton was on the fast track to become a partner at consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers when life intervened. With a baby on the way, it
My Pivot is a new Wall Street Journal feature in which executives reflect on the successes and setbacks of their careers.
John Peyton was on the fast track to become a partner at consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers when life intervened. With a baby on the way, it was time to stop flying to corporate clients five days a week and find a new job.
That led to one of the pivots that paved the way for Peyton to eventually become the chief executive of Dine Brands Global, the owner of Applebee’s and IHOP, in 2020. Along the way, the 56-year-old businessman went from being a conflict-avoidant consensus builder to plunging into disputes at major hotel and restaurant chains.
But before all of that, he had to overcome an unfavorable performance review. Here’s how he got there:
A horrible performance review
Early in Peyton’s career at PricewaterhouseCoopers, he received an unfavorable performance review for his work as an auditor, and said he worried that he might lose his job. He shifted to the bankruptcy and turnaround consulting unit, and his boss there recognized his talent for that line of work, he said. Peyton said the move saved his career—but he still holds on to that performance review as a reminder of the importance of receiving difficult feedback and fresh starts.
From PwC veteran to being the new guy at Starwood Hotels
Fresh out of college, Peyton began devising turnaround strategies for PricewaterhouseCoopers’ clients. He was on the cusp of entering the partner track at 30 years old when the imminent birth of his second child prompted his wife to lobby for a lifestyle change, triggering an unexpected job search. Peyton landed at Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide, then a network of around 700 properties run by investor Barry Sternlicht. Three months after starting at Starwood, Peyton was tasked with designing global standards for the company.
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“I had that panic mode,” Peyton said. “I’m 30 years old, I’ve just left my 10-year career, where I knew where I was going. I don’t know hospitality and I don’t know anyone in the company.”
On his second day in the new role, Peyton devised an organization chart that the company never had, he said. The company’s new chief operating officer told him to keep going, and he would end up spending two years helping Starwood standardize processes ranging from hotel check-in to how many times a maid should touch a bed during cleaning.
Peyton pours syrup on his pancakes at an IHOP in Melrose Park, Ill. The company he leads, Dine Brands Global, owns the IHOP, Applebee’s and Fuzzy’s Taco Shop brands.
From outside adviser to managing internal conflict
One Friday, the company’s COO called Peyton into his office and said that on Monday, he would now oversee Starwood’s relationships with the independent operators who ran many of its hotels in North America. The role sent Peyton further away from consulting and into directly mediating relationships between Starwood and some of its key partners.
Early on, Peyton was given an angry letter from a Japanese company that was one of Starwood’s largest operators. Peyton was told his goal should be to try to avoid Starwood getting sued. Six months after trying to resolve the dispute, the operator wrote another angry letter, this one complaining about Peyton.
“It’s one of those moments where you say to yourself, ‘Should I prepare my résumé?’” said Peyton, who said he was still questioning his decision to leave outside consulting at the time.
Starwood executives supported the way he approached the dispute, and Peyton said he came to love managing the ups and downs of negotiating with independent operators.
The biggest pivot of all
In 2019, Peyton was working in a senior role at real-estate brokerage Realogy Holdings when he was approached with an offer to jump to Dine Brands as CEO. He assumed the role in January 2020.”It became an even bigger pivot than Peyton expected. He was still learning the ropes of running a publicly traded restaurant company when Covid-19 struck. His roughly 350 franchisees suddenly had to close their dining rooms and he needed to shore up the company’s finances.
Peyton said he took on a new mind-set: just act. He met several times a week with his teams helping restaurant operators to run their restaurants with closed dining rooms and shifting local regulations. Franchisees bolstered their to-go businesses, and then worked to staff up when they could serve dine-in customers again when pandemic restrictions loosened.
“This was a once-in-a-century business challenge, for all of us,” Peyton said. “Every day was the first of its kind.”
Peyton has since pivoted back to more typical CEO functions. In December, he led the acquisition of the company’s third brand, Fuzzy’s Taco Shop, and said he’s open to future deals. His experience working with hotel franchisees has transferred well to restaurants, he said.
“It’s the way I was trained,” he said. “There’s always dissent. It’s how you deal with dissent in a constructive and fair way.”
Patrons at an IHOP in Melrose Park, Ill., in May.
Write to Heather Haddon at [email protected]
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