Happy Sunday Everyone:
Our family has a tradition of going to San Francisco the weekend before Christmas. We stay in Union Square, we do a little shopping and then go to one of our favorite restaurants. Having no relevance to this Sunday Thoughts but a good story…Kim tried on a ring yesterday at Harry Winston (we were only having fun). I asked the saleslady how much the ring was.. ..only $11.3 million. Who buys that? She told me people do or they wouldn’t be made…crazy.
We get done shopping and boys are beat. They head back to their hotel room and Kim and I head out for a drink. We noticed there was a new Mastro’s up the street. If you haven’t been to one, they’re amazing. They will break the bank but if there is a place that is worth it, this is it. We head in, sit at the bar and wait. Bartender comes over, super nice, introduces himself (Troy), shakes our hands, and takes our drink order. Drinks are expensive but they almost feel worth it because they give you more than normal. I’m not looking for a “deal” but if you’re going to spend $20+ on a glass of wine, error on the side of over pour. I thought it was just us and then watched them do it for everyone. I’m sure it’s on purpose. Troy tells me it’s their 2nd night open. Kim and I are watching everything in amazement. There are guys/gals with ear sets in, directing, ordering, checking on every detail with every customer. Seemed like there was one employee per client.
One of the folks directing traffic stands about 3 feet from me. After 5 minutes I finally tell him I’m blown away with how the place runs, especially for their 2nd night, and then complemented Troy. He then engages in a full blown conversation with me. I’m aware he has a lot going on…it was him talking more than me. Tells me they’ve been training for the past 3 months daily and how great it was to finally put it to work. Funny comment “you can only train a bus person how to fill water so many times before they break”. We get done talking, he shakes our hands, tells us he appreciates us coming in and then walks over to Troy and whispers something in his ear. Next thing I know Kim and I are trying a 2006 Dom Perignon on the house, and Troy is asking if we’d like a tour of the entire place. Upon leaving we must have walked by 8 employees…bussers, servers, managers, maître d… .every single one of them “Thank you for joining us, have a wonderful evening”….with eye contact and a huge smile.
Take aways for me and hopefully something for you to consider:
1. In order to get things right 95% of the time or more requires massive training and preparation. As I close out the year I’m thinking about how dialed-in our own training is for on-boarding employees, clients, and business partners. 3 months of training before speaking to a single customer is amazing.
2. Bandwidth and cross training. Our business is certainly more complicated than Troy and the bartenders but they have the bandwidth for Troy to take me a on a private tour of the restaurant while the other clients don’t miss him. Maintaining costs and efficiency while balancing client/employee satisfaction are actually in alignment with one another. The more we train the more efficient we are. I need to remember this next time I say “I don’t have time to train”.
3. Always be proactive in gifting to clients I like. Usually it’s the squeaky wheel bitching about service that gets the wine. They went the other way. It’s just as easy for me to do the same.
4. Being friendly-I’ll give us some props on this one but Kim didn’t ask to try on an 11 million dollar ring and I didn’t ask for a free glass of very nice Champagne. Those two things happened because we simply engaged with people we didn’t know and they wanted us to feel special, which we did.
Final thoughts as we all have the in-laws/outlaws coming into town. Assuming you love your spouse, take one for the team and be nice and engage. I’ve ruined one Christmas by doing the opposite and received some serious “kudos” for following my own advice last year. Theory of “you’re only as happy as your unhappiest child”….also applies to your spouse and how you treat their family.
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all of you!!