I love the people I work with. They each have such a great spirit to serve others, which is definitely what you want in a café. But when it gets really hard is when they can’t please a customer. I’m so grateful that all the employees tend to accept responsibility when something goes wrong, and try to make it right. But sometimes you just can’t please a person, and that’s when the employees tend to get frustrated and shut down.
Wayne Dyer tells a story of walking along the beach one day and encountering someone who said, “I just moved here and was wondering, what are the people like in this area? Where I come from, the people are really hostile and self-centered and always in a rush.”
Wayne responds, “Oh, you’ll pretty much find it the same way here.”
Then, a little further down the beach, another person comes over to him and says, ” I just moved here and I’m new to this area, and was wondering what the people are like around here. Where I came from, everybody was great – very friendly, warm and neighborly.”
Wayne replies, “Oh, you’ll pretty much find it the same way here.”
When a customer comes in and comments on how nice the place looks, how interesting the menu is or that we have a great beer or wine selection, we know they are expecting a great experience – and you know what, they pretty much get it. They also tend to be extremely gracious if something is out of stock or if a mistake is made, but rarely are mistakes made with these types of people.
On occasion, a customer comes in with their bad day, on the defense and expecting things to go wrong. Guess what? It does. We may have our best people working at that moment and unconsciously they will screw up royally to meet the expectation of that person. I sometimes wonder if it’s the fear we have toward an abrasive person, but ultimately I know that we can’t please everyone regardless.
So what I notice are a couple of things:
- When we are doing our best, we can’t blame ourselves when there is another person involved whose experiences, mood and expectations are set for negativity.
- We CAN affect our own reality with honest expectations for good outcomes.
- We are all responsible for our own happiness in life regardless of what is happening in other peoples’ lives.
- We are not responsible for another person’s happiness.
How much happier could we be if we could just embrace this truth?
Noticing Great Expectations,
Bernadette Peters
December 28, 2011 at 2:59 pm |
Right on Sister! We are responsible for our own happiness (or lack there of). I had someone recently say to me that I had taken their joy away for an activity they had already experienced (they had asked for my opinion and I gave it, they didn’t like my response). I was taken back that first of all, I could have that power and second that they thought that was even possible. If we all maintained accountability for our feelings and actions, how much happier we would all be! Happy New Year!