Skip to navigationSkip to main contentSkip to right columnADVERTISEMENTSherin ShibuWed, July 15, 2026 at 4:55 PM GMT+2 3 min readSmith Collection/Gado | Getty ImagesEntrepreneur Media LLC and Yahoo Finance LLC may earn commission or revenue on some products and services through the links below.Key TakeawaysChipotle promoted 23,000 employees last year, and all of the company's regional vice presidents were internal hires.Chipotle's chief operating officer, Jason Kidd, identifies who is worthy of a promotion by having dinner with them.Every week, Kidd pops into about a dozen Chipotle stores and has a 90-minute dinner at the end of the day with three to four members of the location's regional team.When hiring, promoting or investing in employees, company leaders look for everything from how polite they are to the receptionist to "side quests" or self-driven hobbies. They also look at the