When I was in my mid-twenties, I quit my corporate office job to work across the road in a coffeeshop. It was wonderful. My whole role was essentially to serve, shine, and honour the customer. The mandate from the owner was to "deliver an experience”, to remind the customer that they are important, interesting and worthy of respect.
One of my favourite customers in the coffeeshop was Simon. Long black, two sugars.
He would stride in, run his fingers through his greying hair, and wink at the barista. “The usual, Ellie, and how are we all today?”
We would banter a bit, and bring his order out to his window seat, while he reads through the finance section of the paper. What made him memorable was how often he complained about his coffee - about twice a week, he would return to the counter, look me in the eye, and shake his head.
“Coffee’s shit today, Nath.”
And, in true the customer is always right style, I would nod, and lean in, and reply, “What are you tasting, Simon?”
“It’s burnt. The beans are burnt. Ellie screwed up the shots.” Ellie is right next to me, and utters a tiny sigh.
“Well, Ellie and I are so sorry. We screwed up. Can we make you a fresh cup?”
“Yeah, thanks guys.” (another wink.)
Ellie makes another cup, with exactly the same beans, same shots, and Simon loves it. And he returns twice more that day.
It’s the hospitality industry, right? A hundred years ago it was exactly the same. There's a a report from a 1905 newspaper about how the Sears Group treated customers:
"Every one of their thousands of employees are instructed to satisfy the customer regardless of whether the customer is right or wrong. The customer comes first, last and all the time.” - (Des Moines, Iowa, 1905.)
This is the hospitality mandate. We take care of the customer, give them what they want, make sure they’re happy, and they’ll return and buy again. We pretend that they’re right, so that they return, because we want their money. It’s a transactional relationship: "You are paying me money, so I am at your service.”
Thinking back to that coffeeshop, there were actually some concerning behaviours going on.
Simon, long black two sugars, believed he knew more about coffee than we did. The power to decide if the coffee is good enough rested entirely with him.
Tyson, two macchiatos for him and his dad, didn’t care about the coffee at all. But he demanded our time. No matter the queue, we must ask him about his shop and his family, and as long as we listen, he’ll return each day for more coffee. The power to control our time together was entirely with him.
Claire, skinny latte and a slice of toast, doesn’t even look at us. She’s often on her phone when she drops her cash on the counter, and she drums her nails continuously until her order is ready, and then she’s gone. We exist only to get her the fix she needs.
Now, for us hospitality staff, this was fine, par for the course. We knew that we were awesome at making coffee - that the beans were fine, the shots were great. We knew that what we were really selling was an experience, some attention, whatever the customer needed. We knew that in the end, the customer was handing over their cash to us, and that’s the transaction that mattered.
The fallout, though, was that we couldn’t respect those customers who didn’t respect us.
So we treated them like children - We pandered to them, played their little games, and then took their money. And, like children, the customer-who-is-always-right became entitled, entrenched in their belief that they deserved everything.
The power was out of balance, and the respect was out of balance. The expectations were all off.
I'm not making coffee for people anymore, but I do still experience these imbalances. As a parent, I've had children demand their way, as if I just exist to serve them. As a husband, I've sometimes forgotten we are a team, assigning respect and power based on the amount of income we each earn.
Health professionals have patients demanding more, and faster, and better. Receptionists are being abused for not performing. Bazillion-doller corporate deals are falling over because someone felt disrespected. People are dying because others have too much power.
I'm not saying that power is bad, or respect should be prescribed, or expectations should be lowered, or anything like that. These are elements of humanity that spark great and wonderful things in life. But, when the balance goes out, it happens subconsciously, and our response is disconnection: we can't even describe exactly why, but we feel it, and we distance ourselves from each other.
I honestly loved my time in coffee. I loved reminding others that they were important, and interesting, and worthy of respect. I want to be that voice in all my relationships, in all my business dealings. I'm realising that transactional relationships are everywhere in life, with so many "I gave you this, I now deserve that" imbalances, but it's okay. We're all human and we're getting there.
What gives me hope, though, are the outliers. Those characters in the system who just somehow rise above it. They’re in the game, but changing the rules.
Like Aldo, who would swing by for a double espresso every morning at 9:45. He's selling the most expensive commercial real estate in the city, but in the coffeeshop he is an equal. He lingers at the bar, asks us all about our lives and interests, notices when Ellie gets a haircut, asks for advice for his home coffee machine.
Or Wayne, decaf flat white, parks his bike around the corner. So excited about our lives. I shot his daughter's wedding.
And Lucy, who crosses the entire city for a skinny cappuccino from us, who asks for our ideas, shares her stories, and thanks us for making her feel so loved.
For these customers, we would do anything. Their humility and vulnerability opened the door for us to share a collaborative power. We all stood together as equal humans, just with different skill sets. The respect was balanced, and we all drew in, we connected, and were all empowered.
So, I'm working on being an outlier. In a world of transactional relationships, I want to find different ways to play the game. So that us humans can stay connected and equal, and share the power, and collaborate for truly great things.