I was appalled at the lack of customer service, quality of preparation, lack of cleanliness, and overall appearance of a fast food restaurant near my home in Oak Run. The two youngsters (couldn’t have been more than 18 years old – if that!) were slow, flat in affect, and seemed utterly bored and tired. When the young man pulled his pants up (must have been half way down under the shirt tails of the LONGEST uniform shirt I have ever seen) right in the middle of preparing our hamburgers,  I thought my husband was going to lose it! 

 

Dr. Henri – we need you! We need you to tell everyone about the importance of developing the people side along with the cognitive side in skills development to ensure business success.  Can’t you hear the smirk or smile, the disdain or interest, or the genuine vs flowery in phone conversations (or in person?).

 

I’m from a generation that talked about politeness, service, graciousness, self-discipline, holding your tongue and temper, and I am finding it very sad that we are changing so drastically in this country re how we do business with other inter and intrapersonally. I am also part of that same generation that learned to communicate assertively without injuring another to get our own needs met. We seem to be regressing back to the more passive-aggressive methods of talking (or not) to one another. 

 

You can have all of the systems in place, all of the equipment, all of the ideas, all of the resources and if employees are not “people savvy and emotionally intelligent” there will be problems.   Guaranteed. 

 

We are, after all, still people doing business with people.