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I liked this story a lot, but I had a slightly different experience. I started washing dishes in a bakery over the summer, at age 12. Somewhere in the summer

I liked this story a lot, but I had a slightly different experience. I started washing dishes in a bakery over the summer, at age 12. Somewhere in the summer of my 16th or 17th year, I think the boss finally realized that I was simply better at other things, after years of what must have been charity on his part to keep me on. He could bang out a full sink of dishes in about three minutes. For me it took closer to 30, so while we generally never quite ran out, there was never an opportunity for me to do anything else. I just couldn't leave them dirty, not even a little bit. I found the concept of not doing a 100% job to be repulsive for some reason. I sometimes still do, and it does cause problems when I should have just stopped at 90% (or more like 30% with the dishes) -- perfectionism definitely has some drawbacks. I did much better as a cashier.

tsotha 14y ago
Hah! That was me at McDonald's. One night everyone else was waiting impatiently in the dining room at 1:00 AM as I was furiously scrubbing pots sparkly clean. The team lead came over, observed my technique for a few minutes, sighed, and said "Most people just knock the worst of it off. We want to go home." They wouldn't let guys be cashiers, though, so it was making burgers and cleaning pots for a whole summer.
- shard 14y ago
  Is not letting guys be cashiers a corporate rule, or just in that particular McDonald's? What's the reasoning behind that?
  - xenophanes 14y ago
    There is a male cashier at my local McDonalds, so it can't be a universal rule today. I think it sounds more like a dumb quirk of one store than corporate policy.
    - tsotha 14y ago
      Yeah, I don't think it's corporate policy. I don't think it was corporate policy even decades ago when I worked there. Probably illegal now. When we complained about it the manager said "If you came here to buy a meal, who would you rather see?" As a teenage boy I couldn't argue with that logic.
  - Spooky23 14y ago
    The manager probably got a bonus for upsells. High school girls are better at doing that. I worked at a coffee/bagel place in a mall across from a chain casual restaurant (Think Pizza Uno/Ruby Tuesday). The manager's compensation was based not only on sales/margin, but the average table occupancy. This one guy hit his number by hiring tall girls as hostesses, getting them to dress up (they tended to look like they were heading to a party) and having them stand in the doorway. Basically, they were a fishing net -- it was amazing to watch, we could tell when he was working based on the crowd.
- wpietri 14y ago
  Awesome. Me too! I still remember one day after the breakfast shift, scrubbing the cruft off of some of the fryer baskets. The manager, after watching me quizzically for a while, said, "You don't have to get them that clean." I said, "Well, I'm gonna," and went on scraping. I've learned to be more tactical about my high standards, but when pressed to cut quality, my default answer is still a polite GFY.
  - seanmcdirmid 14y ago
    I was the same way and I actually preferred to be on dish, because I could get something done (and at night, I could blast music)! I eventually got pretty fast at it and was appreciated for not doing a crappy job.

tsotha 14y ago

Hah! That was me at McDonald's. One night everyone else was waiting impatiently in the dining room at 1:00 AM as I was furiously scrubbing pots sparkly clean. The team lead came over, observed my technique for a few minutes, sighed, and said "Most people just knock the worst of it off. We want to go home." They wouldn't let guys be cashiers, though, so it was making burgers and cleaning pots for a whole summer.

shard 14y ago
Is not letting guys be cashiers a corporate rule, or just in that particular McDonald's? What's the reasoning behind that?
- xenophanes 14y ago
  There is a male cashier at my local McDonalds, so it can't be a universal rule today. I think it sounds more like a dumb quirk of one store than corporate policy.
  - tsotha 14y ago
    Yeah, I don't think it's corporate policy. I don't think it was corporate policy even decades ago when I worked there. Probably illegal now. When we complained about it the manager said "If you came here to buy a meal, who would you rather see?" As a teenage boy I couldn't argue with that logic.
- Spooky23 14y ago
  The manager probably got a bonus for upsells. High school girls are better at doing that. I worked at a coffee/bagel place in a mall across from a chain casual restaurant (Think Pizza Uno/Ruby Tuesday). The manager's compensation was based not only on sales/margin, but the average table occupancy. This one guy hit his number by hiring tall girls as hostesses, getting them to dress up (they tended to look like they were heading to a party) and having them stand in the doorway. Basically, they were a fishing net -- it was amazing to watch, we could tell when he was working based on the crowd.
wpietri 14y ago
Awesome. Me too! I still remember one day after the breakfast shift, scrubbing the cruft off of some of the fryer baskets. The manager, after watching me quizzically for a while, said, "You don't have to get them that clean." I said, "Well, I'm gonna," and went on scraping. I've learned to be more tactical about my high standards, but when pressed to cut quality, my default answer is still a polite GFY.
- seanmcdirmid 14y ago
  I was the same way and I actually preferred to be on dish, because I could get something done (and at night, I could blast music)! I eventually got pretty fast at it and was appreciated for not doing a crappy job.