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Thanks For Looking Out
By: Patrick Maguire
Book Chapter: Human-to-Human Service
Posted: 11/22/2009
It’s been an interesting couple of weeks since the blog was launched. After several media outlets linked to my list of 64 Suggestions for Restaurant Customers, we had 10,260 visits to the site over a 5-day period. We’ve had visitors from every US state and from 80 other countries. Thanks to all of you for visiting the blog, and to everyone who steered traffic to my site by attaching a link in your stories.
I also appreciate all the comments and discussion following the 64 suggestions. Here are some of the greatest hits that caught my eye:
#4-Meals: “Just because a diner shells out a waiter’s tip…does not mean they ‘own’ that person and get to abuse him/her.”
#11-tpdx: “…just be a decent person to me and I’ll be a decent person to you.” (Seriously, it’s not that hard.)
#16-Xiao Gou: “The customers who truly win are the ones who come in intending to have a pleasant meal and succeed in doing just that.”
#24-Jude: “One customer at a time.” (I love this quote and it’s going in the book.)
#40-John: “And I get that servers get a bad rap. But at the same time, a job is about just that – providing excellent service.” (I agree 100%. Please see the introduction to my book in the red box in the right-hand side of this page.)
#47-Gwen: “I am no longer a server, but I hold the position dear to my heart… I had years of martial arts training and had no problem instinctively taking someone down if they grabbed me by surprise…No one wants anyone to get hurt.” (Love that.)
#48-JP: “Just please be respectful and acknowledge people in the service industry as human beings. It’s really not that difficult.” (Amen.)
#51-Michelle: “Come on now, am I a dog and will get a doggie treat if I perform well?”
#59-Boston Restaurant Guy: “The average restaurant profit and loss statement has 30 line items to manage. Add to that typical business challenge an organic, perishable, maddeningly inconstant product that must be consistently manufactured by hand hundreds of times a day. There is a varying human element in production, distribution, and of course consumption. Oh yes, toss in the weather and you begin to more fully understand the challenge your corner bistro undertakes in their daily battle to do what they love and keep the doors open.”
#61-Micaela: “I guess a forum like this is just a place where we can let off some steam and say, hey, think about it, we are all just people here!”
#62-Jon C.: “In almost all cases, rudeness and arrogance have a ripple effect, sometimes throughout the entire establishment…”
#68–Jenny: “I’m sensing (and welcoming) an overall movement formed of restaurant staff and patrons alike who are no longer willing to smile politely in the face of jerks. I hope it catches on.”
I’m with you Jenny. I’ve actually tweaked the mission of my project a bit after reading all of your comments. The mission of the blog and book is to engage people in a dialogue that will result in more respect for all service industry workers and greater civility among human beings.
I also received several emails from readers, including a jovial exchange with Bruce Buschel, the author of the list of 100 Things Restaurant Staffers Should Never Do. For the record, Bruce seems like a good-natured guy, and we agreed to raise a glass or two in the future. Bruce, if you’re reading this, I’d like to volunteer to work in your new restaurant on opening night. After all of the publicity, it’s bound to be an eventful evening…
As I was reading through the comments to my last post, I remembered an excerpt from the Human-to-Human Service chapter of my book:
In May of 2008 I was walking home from the gym and came upon a street person sitting on one of the lower stairs of a stoop. His eyes were closed, his head was slumped with his chin resting on his chest, and his elbows were resting on his knees. He looked very peaceful with his face in the warm sun. He had a nip of booze, and a beer in a twisted brown bag, on the step next to him.
What caught my eye and made me stop was the lit cigarette delicately balancing between his fingers. There was a long trail of ash about to fall into his lap as he dozed off. Hey Guy, I said, startling him, as he awoke and caught my eyes. I didn’t want the butt to fall in your lap, I said, as he looked up at me. His spontaneous reaction struck me and made me think of the bigger picture as I walked away, Thanks for looking out, he said succinctly, while flicking the ashes on the sidewalk.
After smiling at him I thought– Imagine how much easier all of our lives would be if we all looked out for each other a little more? My neighbor reinforced a valuable lesson that day. We can all learn so much by observing and participating in what’s happening around us, by paying attention to each other, getting involved, and looking out for each other more often.
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
On November 11th, 2001, Sam Allis wrote a piece in the Boston Globe called, The Hard Season. “… November is crowned by the great American holiday, Thanksgiving. We invented it here. It is a perennial winner because it carries none of the emotional baggage of Christmas and the religious spin is light. As Garrison Keillor wrote, it’s a peasant holiday where all you have to do is sit down and eat.”
Enjoy your Thanksgiving.
11/25 update: Please read this piece called, Redemption and Gratitude by Yvonne Abraham in today’s Boston Globe. If anyone is wondering, the song that Bobcat was singing is I’m Stone in Love With You by The Stylistics in 1972. Great article, great song.
7 Responses to “Thanks For Looking Out”
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Permalink | Posted in Human-to-Human Service | 7 Comments »
I agree and think it would be great if we could actually start a ‘sea change’ in society of actively looking out for each other…..”unselfish guardianship”…..wouldn’t that be quite different from today’s world where narcissistic behavior is so prevalent everywhere.
Sometimes the best Thanksgiving stories are the simplest.
Gratitude is a required value that all parents should teach their children. Unfortunately, some parents need to learn that value FIRST, before they can teach it.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Bob C
…….Thats right Bob, parents SHOULD be teaching this but they are not; thats why teachers like me talk about it. Great subject Patrick. I teach hospitality/ culinary arts in a huge technical high school and discuss this all the time. Not only for my subject matter but as a life skill. My school is big, clean and safe and we want to keep it that way. By discussing this it empowers our kids to take care of not only themselves but their peers,looking out for each other at the bus stop, in school and at home.
Unfortunately many people would rather dial 911 to “get this bum off my stoop” than show some compassion.
Hats off to you and a reminder that I should be doing the same and am not alone.
Thanks for the incentive.
I am enjoying this read. The world would be a nicer place if we did make that effort to extend a hand to our neighbor. Awesome thought going into this Thanksgiving season…Thanks.
If we all captured this “spirit of Thanksgiving” as a way of life…Everyday would be a celebration of the innate goodness of the human condition!! It all begins with each one of us!! Positive, energizing and inspiring. Great thoughts moving into what can be a chaotic, manic, and exhausting season! I like the emphasis on “greater civility..”
Hi.
I was very excited to learn about you in the Globe magazine, as I have been working in the customer service industry (happily) for 8 years.
In addition to suffering indecency, I find myself feeling compassion for rude customers. This is because I feel as though our culture, if not the service industry because of competition, has trained people to believe they can act however they choose. Have we done these people a “service”? Doubtful. It seems like more and more businesses are calling their customers “guests”, and fewer and fewer are treating them as guests.
These are themes I have been intending to examine, eventually, in my comic strip on eloandanson.com, whose cast includes the proprietor of a juice bar, the owner of a barbershop, and two men who run a restaurant together.
I’ll be checking out your blog,
thank you,
Al