Once upon a time I got home from work to find my entire family over for a BBQ. I hadn’t had a particularly good day (as was usual for a weekend shift in the summer) and my aunts, uncles and parents sat patiently listening to my rant. I don’t remember what the rant was about or rather WHO it was about but there could have only been 2 options, coworkers or customers. Anyway when I had finished my dramatic retelling someone said, “You know you should write this stuff down, it’s pretty great!” So here I am many years removed from customer service unable to forget the ridiculousness I encountered over years of faithful service to the masses.
You know those people you read about in books or characters in movies that you think are just too far removed from reality to believe, well… I’ve probably served or worked with these people. In fact sometimes I find myself thinking, they could have taken that character further, they didn’t really reach the character's potential. I’m convinced most people think they are perfect customers. They order how they think they should and treat the people they are ordering from adequately. The thing is most people are not perfect customers. In fact no one is really perfect at anything and if you come across one of those people that is near perfect at everything you do all you can to find their imperfections… don’t deny it you do… you’re probably perfect at that skill. Even having spent a fair amount of time dealing with customers I am far from being a perfect one. I try to be nice to everyone who is on the other side of course but I tend to mess up my wording or order too fast … I get order fright in other words! You know when you’re at a restaurant and you tell someone else to order first. Well I’m practically like that if it’s just me at the order box in drive-thru. The only problem with that is there is no one else to go first so I just end up looking like an idiot!
Sometimes I nervously laugh when I’m ordering and I know that the other person is thinking, ugh I’m putting this one in my book for sure.
I had many coworkers that thought they were pretty stellar as well. Perhaps it’s human nature to hold ourselves in high esteem even if we’re horrible at our jobs… at least we may be the best at being horrible! Aim high and be the best at something, that’s what I always say!
I think I was a pretty good employee. I was aware that I was doing a job and being paid to do it and probably went above and beyond my duties simply because that is what I was brought up to do… ok perhaps I never really did that at home but for OTHER people I always put my best foot forward! I always wondered what my parents thought when people would say what hard working daughters they had. I wouldn’t have been surprised if they had asked for video evidence of our work habits! But enough about me how about the ones that praised themselves and complained that they weren’t being compensated enough for their hard work. You know the people who must slip off to an alternate universe during their shift. An alternate universe where they are a speedy hardworking robot and daily save the world. It would explain why they are practically catatonic during their shift; they’re using up all their skills somewhere else and let's be honest saving the world is probably more important than serving coffee so perhaps they do deserve a raise.
