Hoda Kotb Laughs as Ina Garten Details How She Fired an Employee

Ina Garten learned a hard but helpful lesson early in her career.

Food Network viewers best know Garten for her series Barefoot Contessa, which ran for nearly 30 seasons from 2002 to 2021. The cooking show was named after her specialty food shop in the Hamptons, which opened in 1978 and closed in 2004.

“I was running the store, and I was beside myself. It was just too exhausting,” Garten recalled during a recent episode of Hoda Kotb‘s Making Space podcast. “And [my therapist] said, ‘Your employees need two things from you. They need you to be clear, and they need you to be happy.'”

She added, “It was so much more relaxing. It was so much easier to run a store that way. So, I think the two sides of me that seem diametrically opposed, but they’re really not, is kindness and generosity and warm, but also clarity. So, clarity can look like tough because I know what I want, and that’s what I want, and it doesn’t have to be mean. I mean, every once in a while, someone gets thrown off the train. I try and do it in a gentle way.”

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Garten made Kotb laugh as she recounted the first time she had to let a worker go. “The first person I fired was this sweet young woman. Oh, my god. She was so sweet, and it was the first summer, and she was just terrible,” she recalled. “And I took her out in the back, and I said, ‘You know, maybe this isn’t the job for you, but maybe another job would be.’ And the next day, she showed up for work.”

Garten joked that she was “so gentle” with the employee that they didn’t realize they had been fired. “I let her stay for the rest of the summer ’cause I couldn’t do it again! I was so afraid I’d break her spirit.”

Garten said she learned to be kind but direct with the people she works with over time. “When I had Barefoot Contessa — of course, you have to fire somebody. … I would always have my accountant in the room with me, ’cause we shared an office,” she told Kotb. “And I would fire them, and then, they would leave, and she’s go, ‘How did you do that? They thanked you when you left.’ I just said, ‘If somebody’s not happy and not doing their job, they know it. I would just convince them this isn’t the right job for them.'”

Kotb reacted to Garten’s story by sharing her own experience becoming a boss, as she launched her wellness company, Joy 101, last year after stepping down from NBC‘s Today. “I just hired a CEO coach because I’m starting this business,” she explained, noting that the coach has helped her be more assertive.

Prior to Garten’s appearance on Kotb’s podcast, the former Today host was a guest on Garten’s current Food Network series, By My Guest, earlier this year. The show returned for its eighth season on Saturday, October 3. The new episodes will feature guests such as Christina Tosi, Yotam Ottolenghi, Dan Barber, and Garten’s husband, Jeffrey.