My general manager has developed a lovely habit of starting new people on Friday or Saturday nights. Now, if you've ever worked in a restaurant, you'll know that Friday and Saturday nights are the busiest nights of the week. If you were a logical and rational person, you would never, EVER start a new girl who doesn't know what the hell she's doing on a Friday night. Once again, my GM has proven that he is neither logical nor rational.
I walked in to work this afternoon expecting to see only familiar faces. That hope was lost the second I made it through the entrance. Standing at the counter was the dreaded bane of my existence: a new girl. Fuck.
She looks like she's no more than 16 (turns out she's 19, but the girl's got a long way to go. Oh, and the first thing she asked me was if I have kids. Nice). She has no idea what she's doing. She had me in the weeds all night because I had to keep coming over and fixing her screw-ups. And trust me, they were numerous. She didn't even know how to correctly put an order into the POS system. And here's the kicker: this was her THIRD DAY. She should at least be able to hang on her own right now. Half the time she forgets to put her table's orders into the computer after she takes them.
Of course I'm sure the GM loves her. She always answers the phone before the third ring. I actually witnessed her tell an in-store to hold on a minute while she answered the phone. Instead of putting the phone call on hold to take care of the much more important store customer, SHE STAYS ON THE PHONE AND TAKES THE ENTIRE ORDER. The poor guy looked utterly befuddled and put-off, as I would expect him to. And instead of wrapping most (meaning more than half) of the silverware before she left (as she was asked to do), she did a few pairs and decided that was enough. AND LEFT ME WITH MORE THAN 100 PAIRS TO ROLL. I'm the closer. I was there for an extra hour.
She probably thinks I'm a bitch. Hell, if I were her I probably would too. However, it's not my fault that she can't handle her shit. If she can't hang on she needs to jump ship,and she needs to jump it now. I know what I'm doing. I do my job and I do it well. I even do my manager's job most of the time. The point is, I can handle it. I've run the floor completely by myself more times than I can remember, and every single time it was a success. While it's nice to have help, I can handle the place on my own without a problem.
I only say these things and behave in such a cynical manner because I've been through all of this before. I don't have the time or patience to deal with most of the new people that are hired. I can tell within 10 minutes whether or not they'll be able to make it. This girl? I'll be surprised if she lasts two weeks. If she has me in the weeds again Sunday she won't make it past two weeks. She'll run away crying. Trust me, I'll make sure of it.
Friday, February 25, 2011
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
A Brief Into to the Business
I've worked at a particular restaurant for close to a year now. Before I became a waitress, I never really considered the men and women who served and prepared my food. I never gave the waiters and waitresses a second thought, much less considered them to be actual people with lives, thoughts, hopes, and ambitions. And the cooks? Forget about it. I never even saw them. I suppose when I was younger I believed that the food was just magically summoned by some tiffy little food gnomes. To be honest, I can't really say that that's not the case. I've known some cooks in my time who could be referred to as "tiffy little food gnomes" only at their best. We won't even go into what they could be called at their worst. I doubt many of your fragile hearts could bear it. Trust me, some days mine barely can.
Being a waitress has taught me more than any school or university ever has. I always held a pretty high opinion of myself. Am I the prettiest woman in the world? Probably not, but I'm sure as hell not bad looking. Have I won the Nobel Prize? Not as of yet, but a pretty lucrative scholarship has shown me that there are some who see my potential. Am I a bad person?....Maybe not bad so much as misguided, but you get the point.
Being a waitress, if nothing else, has taught me that none of the aforementioned qualities count for shit. Every person who walks through those creaking wooden doors considers me to be beneath them. To these people I'm nothing more than a kid waiting tables. Hell, half of them probably think that I flunked out of high school, had a baby, and am living off of that oh so lucrative government money. Now, is any of that true? Hell no. None of the people who walk through those doors even take a moment to consider the fact that I am a real person, much less that the rest of the staff are real people. And the cooks? Forget about 'em. The only people who get anything that even remotely has the semblance of respect from our customers are the managers. The honest truth? I know more about running the store and handling the customers than most of them do. Now, does that mean that they're bad managers? Certainly not. One of my managers is one of my absolute favorite people on Earth. He's a genuinely kind, compassionate, caring person who legitimately wants to make the customer happy. The fact that he's probably the cutest guy I've ever seen doesn't hurt anything either.
But I digress. Simply being criminally attractive a good manager does not make. Even if he was painfully unattractive, the fact would remain that he's a fantastic manager who not only cares about the customer, but also cares about the staff. There are too few managers in this business who legitimately care about their staff. I know my general manager doesn't. At least not to the extent that he should. The only thing that matters to him is numbers. As long as the numbers are good, the world is perfect. The second they start to go bad, the world falls apart. The fact that we're in the middle of a huge rush doesn't matter. The fact that I'm the only person in the front of the house trying to pacify the hordes of voracious and sometimes angry customers means less than nothing. The only thing that matters is getting the numbers back under control. It truly is a sad, sad reality.
For now, I must abandon ship and succumb to that sultry, salty lass Slumber. But if nothing else I'd like to leave you with this thought: Your waiter is a human being. They are NOT your slave. They want to offer the best service possible and strive to make their customers happy. Unless of course you really piss them off.
But please, be kind to your waiter. And if you're going out to eat at a restaurant that doesn't involve a drive thru, don't forget to leave a tip. At the end of the day, that's really all we have.
Being a waitress has taught me more than any school or university ever has. I always held a pretty high opinion of myself. Am I the prettiest woman in the world? Probably not, but I'm sure as hell not bad looking. Have I won the Nobel Prize? Not as of yet, but a pretty lucrative scholarship has shown me that there are some who see my potential. Am I a bad person?....Maybe not bad so much as misguided, but you get the point.
Being a waitress, if nothing else, has taught me that none of the aforementioned qualities count for shit. Every person who walks through those creaking wooden doors considers me to be beneath them. To these people I'm nothing more than a kid waiting tables. Hell, half of them probably think that I flunked out of high school, had a baby, and am living off of that oh so lucrative government money. Now, is any of that true? Hell no. None of the people who walk through those doors even take a moment to consider the fact that I am a real person, much less that the rest of the staff are real people. And the cooks? Forget about 'em. The only people who get anything that even remotely has the semblance of respect from our customers are the managers. The honest truth? I know more about running the store and handling the customers than most of them do. Now, does that mean that they're bad managers? Certainly not. One of my managers is one of my absolute favorite people on Earth. He's a genuinely kind, compassionate, caring person who legitimately wants to make the customer happy. The fact that he's probably the cutest guy I've ever seen doesn't hurt anything either.
But I digress. Simply being criminally attractive a good manager does not make. Even if he was painfully unattractive, the fact would remain that he's a fantastic manager who not only cares about the customer, but also cares about the staff. There are too few managers in this business who legitimately care about their staff. I know my general manager doesn't. At least not to the extent that he should. The only thing that matters to him is numbers. As long as the numbers are good, the world is perfect. The second they start to go bad, the world falls apart. The fact that we're in the middle of a huge rush doesn't matter. The fact that I'm the only person in the front of the house trying to pacify the hordes of voracious and sometimes angry customers means less than nothing. The only thing that matters is getting the numbers back under control. It truly is a sad, sad reality.
For now, I must abandon ship and succumb to that sultry, salty lass Slumber. But if nothing else I'd like to leave you with this thought: Your waiter is a human being. They are NOT your slave. They want to offer the best service possible and strive to make their customers happy. Unless of course you really piss them off.
But please, be kind to your waiter. And if you're going out to eat at a restaurant that doesn't involve a drive thru, don't forget to leave a tip. At the end of the day, that's really all we have.
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