If SBLs ran the world things would probably go a lot smoother. This week, Laura Williams reflects on a restaurant experience that gave her food for thought – even if the service left a little something to be desired
A few weeks ago, John and I decided to revisit one of our favourite restaurants near where we used to live. When we were going through the protracted, complicated and frustrating process of finding and buying a house, we spent a lot of time planning, ranting and drinking in this place so we were looking forward to returning with that weight being lifted off our shoulders!
When we arrived, we were greeted and seated, and our drinks orders taken – then we spent some time eyeing the menu and reminiscing about the house-buying process from hell. It must have been 20 minutes later when we realised that not only had our drinks not arrived, but nobody had also been over to take our order.
Not thinking much of it, we flagged down a passing waiter who said he would go and get our drinks and then take our food order. In the meantime, another waiter appeared, requesting to take our food order. Shrugging this off, we hungrily placed our orders and waited for our drinks.
Five minutes passed.
Then another five.
Nothing.
I should probably point out that the place wasn’t exactly hopping. We were eating pretty early so we were ahead of the evening rush, and all looked generally calm.
When a third waiter passed, we again requested our drinks. We were apologised to and reassured that they would be with us imminently before he too disappeared into what we could only assume was a black hole at the end of the bar!
Our original waiter appeared some time later with said drinks and then hilariously asked ‘Are you ready to order yet?’
Having got completely befuddled with the drink’s debacle, we suddenly realised that the two couples seated near to us (who had arrived after us!) were polishing off their first glasses of wine and their starters while we still hadn’t taken a sip of our drink or even seen our starters!
Can you guess what happened next?
Yep, we had to intercept another two waiters who both went to ‘check’ on them. It turns out, our order had been ‘overlooked’ and would be out ‘very soon’! More drama of the same flavour unravelled over the course of our evening so needless to say, we skipped dessert!
The thing is, despite the fact the whole episode was frustrating, I couldn’t get mad. Everybody we spoke to was genuinely lovely and appeared to be trying their absolute best to make it right.
Instead of complaining, we became totally fascinated by observing the whole set-up – we looked at table allocations, waiter coverage, bar service and restaurant management and by the end of our meal we knew exactly where it had gone wrong, how it had gone wrong and what they needed to do to fix it!
Obviously, we didn’t share these observations, but I thoroughly enjoyed putting my SBM brain to good use and muttered my usual mantra of ‘if SBMs did’… in this case, ran restaurants – then they’d be the bloomin’ best!
While it wasn’t the perfect evening, it did remind me that sometimes, no matter how well-intentioned and diligent and hard-working we are, things can still go wrong. And when they do, we might not be the right person to understand what’s gone wrong or how if we’re in the thick of it.
Because we’re so busy doing, we might even be completely oblivious to things, that to other people, are blindingly obvious. Asking for input from the ‘outside’ may feel scary but sometimes, that outside perspective is exactly what we need.
As the year draws to a close, use this time to think about what you’d like to go better next year and how some external insights might be able to help you.
Who can you ask for some honest and objective feedback?
Remember, this job may feel lonely but you’re never truly alone. Help is always there when you need it, you just have to be ready to ask.
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