I popped out earlier in an attempt to 1) clear my head a bit and 2) get something done. Specifically, I went out with the intentions of 1) giving my CV to a temp agency to get a crappy job so I can actually earn some money, since the supply teaching agencies are being useless right now despite repeated poking, and 2) getting something to eat.
Within the space of five minutes, three separate people in three separate establishments had proven themselves to be absolutely useless. In the world’s constant drive to be more efficient, the introduction of “scripts”, turning real people into walking, talking robots, has made even the simplest of tasks an ordeal.
First I walked into Reed, an employment agency. There was no-one at the front desk, which wasn’t an immediately good start. I looked around a bit and eventually a middle-aged woman appeared out of an office at the back.
WOMAN: Hello, can I help you?
ME: Yes, I’m looking for short-term temporary employment.
WOMAN: Oh? How temporary?
ME: Erm… temporary as in “not permanent”?
WOMAN: Tell me about you.
ME: I’m Pete. Here’s my CV. Do you need me to register with you?
WOMAN: (ignoring proffered CV) Here’s what you need to do: You need to go online to our website and register. Then apply for a job and go from there! Okay, thank you! (disappears)
ME: MAAAAAAAAAHHHHH.
Point number 1: I know you can apply online. But via their website, you have to apply for a specific job. I wanted to make myself available for short-term temp positions that I could quit at a moment’s notice in the event of something actually good coming up.
Point number 2: If you want people to apply online, why on Earth do you have a high street presence? It seems that having a publicly-accessible office is completely redundant if the staff refuse to actually do anything for you.
Next, bewildered, I wandered over to Burger King as I fancied one of their sweet chilli chicken sandwiches. I was confronted by a girl who looked about twelve.
ME: Hello. I’d like a sweet chilli chicken sandwich by itself please.
GIRL: I can’t do that.
ME: What?
GIRL: I can’t do that.
ME: No, no, I heard you. Still, what?
GIRL: I can’t do the sandwich by itself.
ME: Sure you can. You just don’t put it in the same bag as some chips and don’t pour me a drink.
GIRL: No, I mean it’s more expensive to have it by itself.
ME: What? That goes against every law of nature.
GIRL: But I can’t do it.
ME: But it gives a price for the sandwich by itself on the board up there. And it’s cheaper.
GIRL: Oh, you mean the sweet chilli Royale? I can do that.
ME: Right. Then let’s do that, shall we?
GIRL: MAAAAAAAHHHHHH.
Pro-Tip, BK: don’t have two things on your menu with almost identical names. It confuses your sales staff. And your customers.
After that, I fancied a coffee. I didn’t get a drink from BK because I specifically wanted a decent cup of coffee. So I wandered over to Costa. Inside, a lemon cupcake glared at me from within the glass case and I decided that yes, that might be a nice accompaniment too. So I wandered up to the counter, only to be confronted by another girl who looked about twelve.
ME: Hi. A medium latte and a lemon cupcake to have in, please.
GIRL: Any cakes or pastries?
ME: I just asked for a lemon cupcake.
GIRL: Oh, right. Is that to have in or to go?
ME: I also just asked for it to have in.
GIRL: Oh, right. A medium latte, right?
ME: Right.
GIRL: And a lemon muffin?
ME: No. A lemon cupcake.
GIRL: MAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH.
When I finally got my coffee, it was accompanied by a lemon muffin, not a cupcake. I didn’t complain, as muffins are more expensive than cupcakes and she only charged me for a cupcake. Take that, The System!
My point is, though, all of these incidents could have been easily avoided by the above people acting like actual human beings rather than robots. It’s unnecessary to have a script to ask people whether they want a cake with their coffee. I have never heard anyone reconsider whether they want a “cake or pastry” after being asked that question. If someone wants a cake (or pastry), they’ll generally ask for it. If they have already asked for it, you don’t really need to ask it again.
The drive to make the world more efficient by standardising everything – including the things employees say – is actually making it more inefficient. So the next time you get asked a stock question by a drone behind a counter, try responding with something they don’t expect. Like this:
COFFEE CHICK: Any cakes or pastries?
ME: Do you like badgers?
COFFEE CHICK: Uhh… is that to have in?
ME: The surreptitiously-garbled mongoose is flatulent in the willow tree.
COFFEE CHICK: Leave before I call the police.
ME: MAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH.
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I agree and sympathise with you entirely!
Having said that I have to partially follow a script where I work 🙁 I forever have to push for more rentals with a healthy dose of ‘would you like to get 4 for £10 instead?’ which I hate doing. 9 times out of 10 they say no because they would have done that in the first place if that’s what they wanted. There’s enough signs around the shop to point out that such an offer exists!
But if I don’t do it and my boss finds out I get in trouble, so I do it.
Damn you sales targets 🙁
Oh, I know the feeling entirely! When I worked for a certain fruit-based computer corporation, there were all sorts of things like this to remember. Fortunately, they were a little looser in their implementation of it – i.e. there wasn’t a set “script” as such, but there were things we were expected to mention if appropriate. That “if appropriate” bit is the thing that a lot of employers seem to forget these days!
Am I witnessing the birth of the Angry Jedi webcomic?! Good show!
Don’t be too hard on the drones. Some are thick-headed, brachycephalic, single-gear shamblers…sure. But some are just your average Joes wishing they were somewhere else, or at least on their way there. They matter to you as much as you matter to them – a necessary interaction.
My first part-time job was in retail, Colorado clothing to be exact – possibly the biggest fraudster “Outdoor” clothing retailer on the planet. I got a warning from my boss after she overheard me talking to a customer.
Customer: So, I’m looking at doing some hiking. What would you recommend from this range of boot?
Me: Yeah, I’d recommend going to Kathmandu, hey. They’d be your best bet for serious hiking boots. These ones here are pretty much only good for restaurants.
Customer: Huh, I see. Always had the idea Colorado were an outdoor clothing company. There you go.
Me: Yeah, pretty convincing. Not a bad shop if you like going to restaurants, though.
I’m not mad at the drones – as I say, I’ve been one! I’m mad at the system that’s created them. I’m much more inclined to trust someone if they speak like a human being rather than a prerecorded message.
Bosses who encourage this sort of stuff need to remove the sticks from their arses and let their employees shine as their own people.
But given that we live in a world where you can get told off for listening to some music on your iPod whilst doing a boring filing job that doesn’t require you to interact with anyone in an office that no members of the public come to visit… I don’t see that happening any time soon, unfortunately. Regulation, regulation, regulation.
Good job the Internet still has free speech, huh? *checks Twitter timeline for any inadvertent terrorist threats*
It’s true. The red tape and bureaucracy that has helped carve out these bizarre regulation-fests needs a bit of a cleave and cut. I don’t see it going away any time soon, sadly. I’m going to point a finger at turnover augment employees into stock and commodities, and an ever-increasing litigiousness being the casual factor in *air quotes* streamlining the business and education sectors via arse-covering rules.
I’m not worried about the Internet so much. Although 99% of social network users should worry about the world learning just how inane they are capable of being!
The system is an ass!
The system can KISS my ass! Yeah, I went there.
AGH! This post brings back memories of when I worked in Games Workshop – great job, would jump at the chance to work there again. Every time a customer came in you would have to greet them and work out if they were new to the hobby or whatnot.
The whole existence of the store relied on repeat customers so we had to try and convince people to sign up for introduction games/paint club/veterans nights etc.
I felt so dirty doing it. I’m a good judge of character and can tell when someone is not interested, but what are you supposed to do when your manager is watching and expecting you to hit 10 intro games a week? It made me feel dirty!
‘s why I left retail. When I started in the place I was working, it wasn’t like that. It was personalised attention, taking a genuine interest in the customer. As time passed, it became more SELL SELL SELL! with increasing pressure to meet sales targets… including a patronising “Sell something and get a sticker! Get enough stickers and you could win a prize!” incentive.
Gaaah. Well out of it.
Oh god, that really does sound terrible. I’m all for personalised attention, makes such a difference for the retailer /and/ the customer as both can come away happy. Not one feeling invaded and the other feeling dirty.
Good luck on your job-hunt, I’ll follow it via Titter 😉