A few years ago, I found myself stuck in a two-hour wait to clear U.S. Customs and Immigration at Montreal-Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport for my trip home after a week teaching workshops in Canada. Normally this process goes quickly but the overhead pager warned passengers of the delay because of “Budget issues in the USA.”
When I finally made it through the pre-screen, then baggage scan complete with a thorough frisking (my titanium hip always sets off the metal detector), and into the Customs and Immigration area, I noticed that the staffing levels were the same as usual. Why the huge delays? These folks were moving at deliberately slow speed. I fly through there quite a bit and it usually moves quick. Agents were getting up and leaving, moving back to their post slowly. delaying getting to the next customer, etc. It was then I realized that the current furlough meant a lot of these folks were losing income – much like all other U.S. Federal workers. They were mad so they took it out on the passengers, many of whom were missing flights.
I spoke to a DoD manager recently and he told me they are being asked to track what is NOT getting done to show how devastating the furloughs are. When tasks aren’t done, they can’t be given to anyone else to do. They have to prove how the furloughs are hurting productivity.
Here’s the problem in both scenarios: The customers and passengers don’t care about the furloughed workers’ problems. They need to get their business done or get to their destination on time. While we understand about the furloughs (my wife is a Fed who will be furloughed 11 days), nobody should care about the customer, passenger, or patient as much as YOU should.
I used to do a fair amount of contract training. I don’t anymore. Typically my fee on a contract workshop was about 20% of what the client is actually billed for. I knew this and sometimes it bothered me since I’m doing 100% of the work. On the other hand, the client didn’t know this and frankly, it’s irrelevant to them. For these gigs, nobody should care as much as I do and I always gave 110% to that company. I could of course “phoned it in” and gave minimal effort, but I took too much pride in my work.
I’m sure there are times Jimmy Buffett isn’t in the mood to do “Margaritaville” in a concert but he realizes for some folks a Jimmy Buffett concert is a “bucket list” item. Nobody cares as much for his audience as he should…so he delivers “Margaritaville” like it’s the first time he’s ever sang it.
Year ago when my wife was the head of Materials Management at Bethesda Naval Hospital, she would take her purchasing agents up on the ward to meet the patients. She’d tell them that when they felt worn out, unappreciated, or just lazy and didn’t push an order through, it was the PATIENT that suffered, not them, the doctors, or the nurses. It made a huge impact on them.
This week, if you feel unappreciated, angry, apathetic, or just don’t give a crap, remember that it’s not about you. Nobody should care about your customer, client, patient, or passenger as much as you do. If you can’t handle that, it’s time to move on and do something different.
My experience in Canada that night hammered that home and I’ll not forget that lesson any time soon. Nobody cares as much as you (or I) should.
