If you’ve never been a waitress
If you’ve never been a waitress, imagine what it feels like to work long hours on your feet, waiting on table after table. Imagine preoccupied customers who ignore you when you stand in front of them or belittle you when you walk away. Imagine sloppy tables, rude demands and frequent complaints. Imagine being the brunt of anger when someone’s meal isn’t the way they wanted it. Imagine constantly apologizing, smiling, saying “No problem” and “Have a Nice Day!” Then imagine how one kind customer–one generous tip or one genuine “Thank you” makes you feel. Imagine how it takes so many good customers to make up for one bad one, and resolve to be the good one.
If you’ve never been a secretary, imagine answering someone else’s phones and getting their coffee. Imagine being responsible for tasks big and small; being overlooked by those who hold titles; being yelled at or harassed in lieu of your boss. Imagine making everything run like clockwork–from the daily reports to the scheduled meetings to the mailed forms/packages. Imagine doing all these things day in and day out, while being talked down to and made little of. Imagine being called “the secretary,” instead of by your real name. Then imagine what it’s like when a V.I.P. talks to you. Imagine when he/she remembers your name, your personal interests, your family. Imagine how it takes so many kind people to make up for one obnoxious one. Then resolve to be one of the kind people.
If you’ve never worked in customer service, imagine being the sounding board for everyone’s complaints. Imagine being cursed at, yelled at, verbally assaulted and attacked. Imagine being called an idiot, a jerk, a fool, a thief. Imagine hearing this every day, all day. Imagine knowing this is part of your job and knowing there’s nothing you can do about it. Imagine being threatened and criticized, personally, for something you had little to do with. Imagine people think they can do this because they’re paying for your service. Imagine they think they have the right to act this way. Imagine you’re being paid under $12/hr. Then imagine what a difference it makes to talk to a calm, rational customer; imagine how it takes so many of these calm customers to make up for the mean ones. Then resolve to be that customer.
I’m reminded all the time lately how the people who make the lowest wages are often completing the hardest tasks and being treated the most poorly. Why do we think it’s OK to yell at the agent on the phone but we’d never do that to the person at church? Why is it OK to stiff the waitress when we’d never want someone to do that do our son or daughter? Why do we only think of ourselves and not put ourselves in someone else’s shoes once in a while?
Filed under a deeper look at life, customer service |
5 Responses to “If you’ve never been a waitress”
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A powerful piece.
Jesus said, “If you have done this unto the least of them, you have done it unto me.” He also says the reverse, “if you have not done this unto the least of them, you have not done this unto me.” (Matthew 25)
I firm believer in the golden rule. I’ve never understood how other people can treat people so poorly. I know I’ve gotten irritated with customer service people in the past, but I always try to remind myself it’s not their fault that company’s have lousy rules.
ok, I am going to take the contrarian view, or you can just call me terrible or inconsiderate.
But sometimes customer service people are just plain rude (even to customers who are not needy nor unreasonably demanding.) making faces, don’t want to help customers.
I have been on both sides, I was in customer service before, had very demanding customers, I was never rude. But I have to say, good customer service these days in the U.S. is very rare.
I had been on the phone with assistants (i.e. secretaries) before, she snapped at me when I was just verifying something.
Customer service people and secretaries take their frustration out on other people, too.
LOL, goldnsilver, I’d never call you terrible or inconsiderate. You brought up excellent points. I suppose I could add a “If you’ve never been a customer..” graph up above, but that’s pretty much everyone.
You’re absolutely right that waitresses and secretaries and other people take their frustrations out on their clients, too. And that’s terrible and it shouldn’t happen. It shouldn’t happen anymore than people talking down to a girl simply because she waits on their table.
However, I suppose I am partial to faulting the client for a few reasons: 1) People in service industries deal with so many people so often, and very often those people are unfair. Not everyone, not all the time. At of course, these workers may ask for it or deserve it sometimes. But people are prone, I think, to do it to them, regardless of how they serve. 2) People in service industries are pretty much thankless.
Nonetheless, if I hadn’t witnessed a terrible situation last week, if I didn’t deal with immediately confrontational people so often, I’d probably be more burdened to write about the need for good customer service (which I def. see) than the need for kindness. Maybe you should write that post (?). I’d love to read it.
I always tip fairly. If the server was halfway decent I give the 20%. If they sucked (and have to really suck) then I give 10-15%.
I just try to put myself in other people’s shoes and how I would like to be treated if i had THAT job. i’ve never been a server but I know people who were and it’s kinda amazing what they have to go through.