Published: October 14, 2007 12:22 am            

I choose to be nice

One of the areas in which I have tremendous passion is customer service, and I have written several customer service columns in the past year. Inevitably, when I write a column on customer service, I receive a number of comments in response to those columns. While most of the feedback is positive, several of the comments have a negative tone, recalling a story of receiving poor customer service from area businesses.

I’m sure that many of these criticisms have been justified. We can all recount instances of poor treatment from service providers. However, I believe the way we act toward those customer service providers can influence the way they treat us.

A few months ago, I was having a conversation with a friend and she brought up several instances recently in which customers she dealt with were outright rude. There was no apparent reason for the rudeness — people just walked in with a pre-determined negative attitude.

We spoke at length about those situations, and I walked away from the conversation thinking perhaps she was being overly sensitive or had just had a bad day. So, I made it a point to watch and listen to people for the next few days. Sure enough, I began noticing the same thing. I saw several instances of people from all walks of life talking to others with a rude or condescending tone in their voice. Just a hunch, but I bet these very same people are the first to loudly complain when others treat them in the same fashion.

In one instance, I was leaving town for a business trip. It was around lunchtime, so I decided to go to the drive-thru window of Taco Bell on my way out of town. Mine was the second vehicle in line, so I rolled down my window and waited to place my order. Ahead of me were two people in a vehicle. They must have placed “special” orders for at least six people.

The poor girl at Taco Bell was trying to get the order right and was in the process of repeating the order. The “customer” (who is supposed to always be right) quickly became impatient and was being a real jerk to the worker. All the girl was trying to do was verify the order so that when the customer drove away, he would have the correct items he had paid for.

I realized then, just maybe, many of our customer service issues are predetermined before the customer ever enters into the restaurant. Let me explain. We, as human beings and free Americans, have a choice. We have a choice whether to approach a situation with patience and a positive attitude or approach a situation with negativism flowing through our veins.

Perhaps many of us harbor some paranoid idea that, unless we assert our rights from the beginning and give the impression that people MUST serve us, then we will always receive poor customer service. Do we really think other people are constantly trying to take advantage of us? Now, don’t get me wrong – there are certainly instances where we must be assertive because there are people out there who will take advantage of others. However, we need to follow the Golden Rule and treat others the way we would want to be treated. In other words, let’s be nice and give others the opportunity to be nice right back to us.

There is an old story about a man who was driving home on a country road one evening when one of his tires blew out. The man checked his trunk and discovered his jack was missing. He noticed a farmhouse with lights on about a half-mile away, so he began to walk toward the house. The man thought to himself, “I hope that farmer has a jack.” As he walked further, he thought to himself, “Hmm, some of these farmers can be peculiar. I wonder if he’ll even let me borrow his jack?” As he neared the farmhouse steps, the man thought, “I bet this farmer is going to be real mean and won’t even let me use his jack.” Finally, the man knocked on the door and, when the kind old farmer answered the door, the man screamed at him, “You can just keep your old jack, you big jerk!” and stormed off the porch. Another missed opportunity to be nice.

There is another old saying that you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. We can choose to be nice and sweet like honey, or we can choose to be mean and sour like vinegar. I, for one, have decided to be nice. Now, that doesn’t mean that customer service should be ignored. I have very high standards when it comes to customer service. We, as paying customers, deserve to have a positive experience, but we must realize that we play a part in that process. After all, whom would you rather serve: someone who is nice or someone who is rude?

I challenge each of you to approach situations in a positive manner for the next two weeks. There is only one person that controls our attitude and outlook toward life, and that is the person you see in the mirror every day. Let’s make the choice to be nice and carry a positive attitude. As for me, I’m off to the store to stock up on honey.



Crystal Dupré is publisher of The Meridian Star. E-mail her at

cdupre@themeridianstar.com.

        

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