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I'm not sure if this is the right forum so mods feel free to put it in the right place.
I came to customers suck because of my own experiences in the service industry and because I love reading personal stories. I never thought customers suck would change my life.
As I said I worked for a long time in a lot of different service industries so I deeply empathize with the majority of these stories. I also teach sociology and psychology, which means every semester I spend a good long time preaching on the fundamental attribution error. In case you haven't heard, the fundamental attribution error is the idea that because we do not know the real motivations of a strangers actions we tend to attribute any negative behavior (slow food service, a tense tone, lack of assistance) as an indicator of the persons fundamental personality, ie "the waitress didn't refill the drinks therefore she must be a lazy person", not "the restaurant might be ubber busy and she's doing her best."
Anyway enough of the Prof tone. My point is that I have always been pretty decent when interacting with service staff, I'm a please and thank you, 20% tipper all the way. But I admit I've been snarky and even used the stern teacher tone a few times. Then I came here, in the past three months I have consciously monitored my behavior, and have worked to be intentionally kind. In the past three months I have also received for free (with absolutely no request on my part) three orders of fries, a movie ticket, 300 copies from Kinko's, a flight upgrade, extra cat food, desserts at an expensive restaurant, two large bottles of carpet shampoo, one jasmine plant, two tomato plants, a history book of Zen, one strand of Christmas lights and a whole package of high quality linen resume paper. All of this from business who aren't normally known for their generosity.
As I said I never asked for these things, nor did anyone of them pop into my head as something I might receive. I also don't think I have been inconvenienced any more then usual, so it isn't like I've had a particular string of bad luck and Karma was helping me out.
I think it's because when you are genuinely nice, when you assume that most people are decent and its generally the situation that sucks, those around you are almost relieved, and that relief can open some amazing doors. Of course some people are just sucky, and some people are having such a bad go of it they can't return the kindness, but really, who cares? The only one you have to answer to is you, and the stuff I've received, its just the icing, the real cake is not feeling paranoid, aggressive, stressed or upset about my interactions at the consumer level.
Too bad more people can't figure that out, but then where would great forums like this go?
Thanks for letting me glow. Keep up the great rants!
I came to customers suck because of my own experiences in the service industry and because I love reading personal stories. I never thought customers suck would change my life.
As I said I worked for a long time in a lot of different service industries so I deeply empathize with the majority of these stories. I also teach sociology and psychology, which means every semester I spend a good long time preaching on the fundamental attribution error. In case you haven't heard, the fundamental attribution error is the idea that because we do not know the real motivations of a strangers actions we tend to attribute any negative behavior (slow food service, a tense tone, lack of assistance) as an indicator of the persons fundamental personality, ie "the waitress didn't refill the drinks therefore she must be a lazy person", not "the restaurant might be ubber busy and she's doing her best."
Anyway enough of the Prof tone. My point is that I have always been pretty decent when interacting with service staff, I'm a please and thank you, 20% tipper all the way. But I admit I've been snarky and even used the stern teacher tone a few times. Then I came here, in the past three months I have consciously monitored my behavior, and have worked to be intentionally kind. In the past three months I have also received for free (with absolutely no request on my part) three orders of fries, a movie ticket, 300 copies from Kinko's, a flight upgrade, extra cat food, desserts at an expensive restaurant, two large bottles of carpet shampoo, one jasmine plant, two tomato plants, a history book of Zen, one strand of Christmas lights and a whole package of high quality linen resume paper. All of this from business who aren't normally known for their generosity.
As I said I never asked for these things, nor did anyone of them pop into my head as something I might receive. I also don't think I have been inconvenienced any more then usual, so it isn't like I've had a particular string of bad luck and Karma was helping me out.
I think it's because when you are genuinely nice, when you assume that most people are decent and its generally the situation that sucks, those around you are almost relieved, and that relief can open some amazing doors. Of course some people are just sucky, and some people are having such a bad go of it they can't return the kindness, but really, who cares? The only one you have to answer to is you, and the stuff I've received, its just the icing, the real cake is not feeling paranoid, aggressive, stressed or upset about my interactions at the consumer level.
Too bad more people can't figure that out, but then where would great forums like this go?
Thanks for letting me glow. Keep up the great rants!
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