I have to get a few things to get off my chest today!
The use of the term “Back in the day.” To me that phrase conjures up the image of something from a long time ago i.e. decades. It is a phrase I don’t expect anyone my age or younger to use. I expect someone 80 years old to say but that isn’t the case today. I hear sixteen and twenty year old say “back in the day” I always want to ask “And what day would that be, Tuesday, Wednesday?” There is no “back in the day” for a teenager because “the day” is happening now!
“I’ll give it 110%!” Not possible now is it? What, are you going to complete the job and then do 10 of it again? All I ask is for 100%. I just want my employees to do the entire job. 110% is also like going above and beyond. Where is the bar set at that you can you went above and beyond what is expected of you. Did you do something special to make a customer happy? If your job is taking care of customers and you made them happy then you did your job. Every customer will have a different expectation of service so maybe you just did what it took—and isn’t that the job?
“Can I borrow?” …a Kleenex, a piece of paper, a cup of sugar, a cigarette, and drink of water! No you can’t borrow any of these things. You borrow a car, a lawnmower, a rake, a pencil. Now if you need…you can have a Kleenex but I don’t want it back when you are done. I don’t want a used piece of paper back, a cigarette butt and I sure as hell don’t want the water back when you are done with it!
“Can I talk to you for a moment?” Here is a question I dread. Any conversation started with this usually means I going to get hit with a solicitation for a charity or a hard luck story or worse…a customer wanting to tell me how to run my business. If I’m getting hit up by a salesperson the statement is followed up with “it will only take a few minutes.” How many minutes is “just a few minutes?” Before I comment to another request for a few minutes of my time I want to know exactly how much time you want from me. I want to agree on exactly how much someone wants to take before I commit to giving it to them.
Speaking of Charities, I can’t hold this in any longer:
There are a lot of good charities out there doing very good things. Weekly I receive about 12 calls/letters from various charities, service organizations and schools asking for donations of merchandise, service and money. I can’t possibly give to everyone. Honestly as a percentage of business income I’m sure we give a higher percentage back to the community then larger organizations. I don’t think we are the exception among most small business owners, I would say we are the norm. I know my fellow business owners give just like we do and sometimes it is sacrificial. So there are a few things that really bother me and I want to get them off my chest. Now I’m not trying make anyone mad---however I’m sure I will.
Let’s go into detail about solicitations from charities, service organizations, school groups, etc. I understand that people pick causes that are near and dear to their hearts. I understand that donations are what a group/charity needs to run on, use to fund projects, pay for uniforms and on and on. The reality of it is this: we cannot possibly give to every group, team, school or charity that requests a donation. What we do give on a yearly basis would surprise most people. As I said as a percentage of our total revenue-- it is really a large amount. So when we do give we wish that the recipient would at least act like they appreciated it…not that some don’t but honestly more act like we owed it to them and never say thanks. More expect it then say thanks and or genuinely appreciative.
On the other side of charity solicitations you have people who get mad when we don’t give. We do try to spread donations around. If we gave to a group’s project or program this year we may not next year, opting to give to another group. Or the same group has multiple fundraisers and the people soliciting will expect a donation every time…please, for a small business it is just not possible to give every time. And another thing about some larger charities, I understand you use volunteers to ask for donations but please organize yourselves by dividing the potential donors up so we don’t get six, eight, ten calls for the same organizations event or fundraiser!
Would some of you who solicit and volunteer for a charity please come back to earth? I don’t mean everyone, there are some folks who are very kind, very appreciative and very humble about what they do for their cause but there are others who are not. You know who you are; you are haughty, rude, and in general just volunteer so you can be seen as “doing something good!” Why don’t you just do something good because it is the right thing to do?
Something else all of you “just to be seen” volunteers need to stop doing; don’t put conditions on how you will volunteer, just volunteer and do the job that is needed -- OKAY? I remember one event for a charity I am involved with where we needed a lot of volunteers. There were a few of us who worked almost the entire event and others who only had to work for 2 hours. This was my first real experience with the “just to be seen” people. We had one lady who had a two hour shift to work. She arrived about twenty minutes late but while she was checking in said she needed to go get something to eat. We had put someone in the “high visibility” spot that she was to be working and had to ask her to work another area when she came back from eating. She was mad and left. I witnessed the same thing over and over and was just so disappointed.
And another thing; It is great when you organization has a charity event. I love the see the spirit in which the events take place, the spirit of coming together for a common cause and working to an end result. But please don’t expect the world around you to stop for your event. I’m baffled by the attitude that we should allow our business to be disrupted to the point where we cannot function for an event. And buy the way, we become the public restroom while the event is going on too! If you are going to make our business a public restroom for your people encourage them to at least buy a damn cookie or something. It cost on average about $200 per month per restroom to keep it clean, stocked with soap and paper goods and maintain the equipment. Please don’t assume there is no cost to me to have an extra 100 people in two hours use my restroom.
Last thing: Around Christmas time I get numerous calls from businesses that are far larger than me asking for door prizes for their employee Christmas party. Honestly, when did this become an acceptable business practice? Who in the hell is going to give me prizes for my employees? Why don’t you do what most businesses have done for years and buy the gifts for employees yourself or don’t buy anything at all but don’t be so damn cheap you ask for freebies!
Thanks for reading my blog!
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