Going the extra mile

“What’s the difference between the regular potato salad and the deviled potato salad?” I asked the clerk behind the deli counter.

It was a simple question asked for two reasons. Firstly, both salads looked identical, and secondly, there was no list of ingredients.

The young man pulled up to his full height and looked at the two salads in question. I’m savvy enough to know that if I extend my hand toward the case, the clerks — any clerks — can’t actually see where I’m pointing. So, I made sure to distinguish the two by name.

That savviness is not accidental; it comes from years of customers pointing in the general direction of the 200 different bottles lined up on the back bar and saying, “What’s that?” It happens just as frequently with the chalkboard wine lists and beer taps.

Perspective, angle and specificity all make a difference. Just ask any physicist, baker or bartender. The observed phenomenon changes with every observer.

The clerk sucked in his lips and tightened his chin.

“That’s a really good question,” he said, while I looked expectantly at him.

“That’s why I asked it,” I said.

He looked at me and then sighed heavily.

“I don’t really know,” he said.

And then he made a choice.

It’s a choice all of us in the customer service business have to make every time we interact with a customer.

Are we going to try and give good service or are we not?

In the service industry, the customer is the virtual Sisyphean rock. The tragic Greek king Sisyphus is doomed for his hubris to roll a rock eternally uphill, only to have it roll back down every day. It’s a never-ending struggle. Philosopher Albert Camus once wrote in his book “The Myth of Sisyphus”: “The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man’s heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.”

Other philosophers have posited that it’s often the journey, not the destination, that’s important. And that’s never more evident than in the service industry.

We’ve all had that service person who has just given up caring. Maybe it’s the butcher, who, when you asked how much something was, said, “I don’t know,” and then walked away. Or the food server who, when asked which dressing a salad comes with, answers: “A good one.”

We in the service business know it too. We know when our co-worker isn’t trying anymore, and we usually know it before they do. Not everybody is cut out for customer service. And sometimes the service lifespan is just limited. I’ve seen the signs many times. Suddenly there are a lot of complaints. Sometimes there’s a lot of moving around, as if changing locations changes what the essence of the business is.

I’ve known bartenders who no longer liked bartending, cooks who didn’t like cooking, sommeliers who were sick of wine and chefs who no longer wanted to be in charge. These folks end up doing all kinds of things to avoid doing the very job for which they were hired.

In the restaurant business, especially the investment part of the restaurant business, there are also many people who want to avoid doing anything at all at that restaurant. They want the cachet, the money and the notoriety; they just don’t want to do the actual work. The unfortunate part of the equation is that somebody does have to do it.

A boss of mine once said to me, “You don’t seem particularly upset with these changes.” It suggested to me that he knew that there might be a problem with them. My response was, “I always have a choice.” And that choice is to do it or not to do it. In the restaurant business, there are always other jobs. But the choice is always the same.

“Let me check,” said my counter clerk.

And that’s really the essence of the service business: the willingness to try. We’ve all seen the cliché of the snobby waiter, the militant soup guy or the arrogant bartender, but you know what? These people rarely last.

It’s the people who are willing to take that extra step that do — until they don’t.

Leaving me with these thoughts:

• What if Sisyphus just stopped rolling the rock? What then? Asking for a friend.

• Eggs were the difference between the two salads, which from an allergen standpoint is pretty important to know.

• Technically, in California, only prepackaged deli items need to have an ingredient list on the label. Other items do not. However, an ingredient list must be available upon request.

• Sisyphus’ original sin was revealing Zeus’ infidelity. From a bartender’s point of view, that’s pretty ironic.

• “None of us would choose to be Sisyphus; yet in a sense, we all are,” once wrote Charlotte Joko Beck, an American Zen teacher and author.

• “Do you have Rolling Rock?” someone somewhere will ask, completely unaware of the irony.