The poor thing looked so lost...
This morning a new hire showed up before anyone else coming in for the morning shift. We had a few minutes to talk, and after ascertaining that she was very young, had almost no customer service experience, and had absolutely no experience working in hotels, I tried to give her some pointers to get her started on the day.
I told her that basically, people want what they want when they want it, and to take nothing personally. However, if you in any way impede someone getting exactly what they want exactly when they want it, you cease being a person in their eyes and become instead an impediment to their joy.
Her eyes got really big.
Was this appropriate? It seemed more tactful that just being brutally honest and saying, "You poor thing. Our guests are the biggest bunch of self-important, entitled pricks on the face of God's gray earth and the Cubic Zirconium members are going to eat you alive. You'll die screaming."
I was trying to be helpful. What would you have said?
This morning a new hire showed up before anyone else coming in for the morning shift. We had a few minutes to talk, and after ascertaining that she was very young, had almost no customer service experience, and had absolutely no experience working in hotels, I tried to give her some pointers to get her started on the day.
I told her that basically, people want what they want when they want it, and to take nothing personally. However, if you in any way impede someone getting exactly what they want exactly when they want it, you cease being a person in their eyes and become instead an impediment to their joy.
Her eyes got really big.
Was this appropriate? It seemed more tactful that just being brutally honest and saying, "You poor thing. Our guests are the biggest bunch of self-important, entitled pricks on the face of God's gray earth and the Cubic Zirconium members are going to eat you alive. You'll die screaming."
I was trying to be helpful. What would you have said?
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