Just got back - disturbing theme....

[Belle102498]

Who the heck is talking about them taking abuse and I highly doubt that any CM takes abuse 24/7. If we are going to discuss this, can't we at least be sensible and talk about real situations?

I think I am the one being quite sensible. Working with the public is not an easy occupation. I am talking about REAL situations, and I am talking from experience. I work in adult education, which is close to the "general public", and I have had to deal with unwanted advances, my life being threatened, and verbal abuse from people who don't get what they THINK they deserve.And these are from people who are in a university setting where you think that they could control themselves and act like decent human beings. Are you talking about being sensible in that respect??? It has been my experience that some vacationers see CM's as servants, and there just to PLEASE them. This is not true! Although they are in the service industry, they may have a job that DOES NOT include catering to every whim of the vacationer. All I am saying, is give the CM's some respect and understanding. Let's talk about some empathy here. I know that word means pretty much zilch to many people today, but let's bring it back into our vocabulary.

 

[gk90]

Before working at WDW I thought people were basically good. Now I believe that people are basically bad and are only good when they want to impress someone.

Thank you for your great posts, and I'm so sorry to hear that you've lost your faith in human nature--I have to agree that there are some people who are basically bad, BUT on the other hand there are still plenty of fine people like you who are basically good and who will behave well whether there are others to impress or not. I hope you can keep on finding good people!

2. When I started at WDW the motto was, "Do whatever it takes to make a guest's day." That is what so many of us loved about working there. If we saw an opportunity to create some magic we were given free reign to do so. Work days were filled with random Magical Moments that not only made the guest's day, but also made it so much easier to put up with the crap. It was all worth it to know that you truly made a difference in a family's life. I get teary just thinking about all the Magical Moments I shared with guests. A CM's job was to make magic for the guests and that always positively affects the bottom line. Many times I would spend my lunch break running around and coordinating with other CMs to create the magic and I absolutely loved it!

3. Once the economy took a downturn, things completely changed. You weren't allowed to do Magical Moments except for a certain number of very specific things. People were getting written up and fired left and right. You were given a specific job and you could not stray from that at all. If a kid fell 20 feet away and you went and helped them up and took them to the nearest ice cream stand to get their ice cream replaced and then maybe helped the family find a ride, you were risking your job if the right person walked by and saw you away from your designated area (before you were risking your job if you didn't help in this way). I would ask my managers what we should do when a guest needs help with such and such and we were told that it wasn't our problem, we were supposed to do our specific job and stick to it. I had friends get fired for helping guests and I knew others who got demoted. It's Disney's way of showing that they are trying to save money and have a zero tolerance policy with CMs. Only problem is they developed a zero tolerance policy towards creating magic. I know a lot of my managers weren't happy about it, but they were in the same situation with their higher ups. It was absolutely ridiculous.


I'm sorry the service has gone down, I really am. In a perfect world it wouldn't. Just realize that in many instances CMs are now being discouraged from going out of their way to do a good job. Imagine how you would work and what your work environment would be like if good work was not rewarded and in some instances would come back and kick you in the butt and every little move was being watched for an excuse to fire you. At the end of my time there managers from other areas (that you wouldn't know) would come up to you posing as a guest and ask for assistance and you would help them out only to be called in to your manager's office a few days later and get written up or demoted because that wasn't your line of business and you should have told them to get help from another CM (this became the norm and caused severe paranoia on the job.)

This makes me so mad--big corporations thinking that the bottom line is everything and losing all their humanity. It makes me want to email/write Disney and remind them very strongly that one big reason we keep going back to WDW is the magic that CMs make. Anyone have the appropriate email address to contact? Maybe if enough of us complain, they'll rethink this cold-hearted policy!

 

[EnnEss]

My favorite posts are the ones talking about generations gone by and how this one is rude etc. In generations gone by you didn't have to work a min wage job, struggle through school, deal with pretencious self entitled consumerists at work and then come out with a degree and still not get a career. Trust me, this generation would love to stumble into careers that paid well for a large portion of their life with little or no training. All I have to do is look at my friend's parents to see hundreds of examples of that.

Go for 2 weeks and work at a mcdonalds, see how easy it is to be on your game 100 percent of the time dealing with people, and after seeing customers in both environments, customers are better at mcdonalds than disneyworld. Out of an entire trip 3 employees out of thousands weren't perfect. Sounds like a pretty good ratio to me.

The disturbing theme is overly demanding, rude people in our society. Workers that have to deal with this sometimes come to reflect that by trying less and less hard. It might not be your fault individually, but you still suffer. Too many frustrated stressed out people use service employees as their verbal punching bag. Ive seen it hundreds of times at WDW and cant count 5 times ive seen employees misbehaving. If people socially outcast those rude and arrogant people, we'd all be happier.

And no, not everyone works in customer service. And they agreed to do the job, not deal with people who are rude and mean spirited. Ive had rude customers and at some jobs they tell you its ok to just tell them to leave. Ive also been in management at companies that have this as a policy to protect their employees, and compared to other places, its a lot happier work place with better customer service overall. It was a large national book store chain, and if customers got rude you were told to ask them to calm down, if they refused you simply told them they weren't welcome at the store, good bye. This didn't happen often at all, because usually people calmed down in that environment. At Disney I've seen people just going crazy. I saw a person there screaming she wanted breakfast at a quick service location and insisting they have it, when they clearly did not and yet yelling and screaming she knows they do in the morning and she wanted it then. They dont even have breakfast there. The fact is the customer isn't always right, they're often wrong and there's nothing that can be done.

Disney's large family image means these types of approaches aren't possible because the media will crucify them and others like to see such a company do badly and laugh, oh look at the irony, they are supposed to be so nice but they weren't to this person. So, they put up with all types of junk, and so do their employees. I cant believe anyone who goes even every now and then hasn't seem some goof spouting off about something insane at a CM, cut the CMs some slack. The customer service levels are amazing at WDW. If something is truly gone bad for you, go talk to a manager, they actually listen at WDW, do so politely and they'll generally try to help you. Petty things like employees talking or slow service under a system you don't have any insight to may be worth complaining about, more than likely it'll come off as petty, as they are petty things. How do you know the employee that didn't want to move w/o a manager's say so wasn't in the right?

 

[WDSearcher]

Just a little story to add to my monstrously long post One day I was working at the Bwalk and my job was to stand at the door and greet guests and hand out stickers. Well, I struck up a conversation with a dad and he was telling me how they had been here for a week and one of his little girl's had gotten the flu and had spent all but one half day of their vacation in their room sick. The heat was just too much for her and every day she would go to bed telling her dad that she really thought she was going to be well enough to go to the parks the next day. He was headed out for breakfast and the family had decided to take the girl to Epcot since it was the closest and they were going to spend a few hours there until the little girl got too tired and would come back and spend the last night in the room watching movies. He wasn't expecting anything from me, we were just talking while he was waiting for some of his other kids.

Well, as soon as he left I decided that even though I couldn't make this girl's flu go away, I could make this a memorable day for her. I went to one of the concierge CMs that I knew and we planned a party in their room. I had gotten the guest's name and the girl's favorite characters so we had each of her favorite characters write her a card, we got some plush toys for her and had housekeeping set it up on the bed and sprinkle pixie dust all around. We also arranged for one of her favorite characters to call her room that evening when we figured they would be in. This all took less than 15 minutes on my part and I was really excited to be doing something that I felt sure this little girl would remember.

So what happened? Well the next day I saw the dad and the little girl carrying one of the plush toys before they left and he told me he knew it was me because I was the only one that knew. Of course I told him that it was all Tinkerbell and I really had no idea what he was talking about He had tears in his eyes as he thanked me for doing that for his daughter. Well, I got in trouble with my manager because I shouldn't have left my greeting position near the door to do this. I explained the whole situation, but that didn't change the fact that my job was to hand out stickers at the door and smile and wave at people. A few weeks later I got a copy of a letter this guest had written to praise me to my management. Did that change things? No. I was told there was never a reason to leave this 3 foot by 3 foot area and that if one of the higher ups had walked by and noticed me gone I would have been fired. This would have never happened pre-recession.

Just some food for thought.

"This would have never happened pre-recession." Don't be silly. Of course it would have. It's not like all the managers were practically perfect in every way before the recession and then all magically turned into evil stepsisters afterwards. There were rotten managers before the recession, just as there are wonderful magical managers working right now.

I'm a 20+ year CM. And I would ask you to please remember that, just as we ask Guests not to lump all CMs together when they complain, and one poster asks another poster to not lump all "young people" together when they complain, please do not lump all managers together when you complain.

The problem in your scenario was your manager -- that one specific person -- not Disney policy and not money. Clearly, if you were able to put together an in-room party with decorations, plush and other elements, money was available for that sort of thing. Otherwise, you and your concierge friend would have hit a brick wall when trying to "make magic." Making magic in that way was obviously still allowed or you'd have gotten nowhere.

It was your manager who decided that he or she was taking a hard line on you not being in your "3 foot by 3 foot area". Maybe they came looking for you and you weren't there and no one else knew where you were because you went on your magical errand without telling anyone. I can see how that might annoy a manager. Look at it from where he stands.

But even if you did follow all the procedures for leaving your area and were only gone five minutes and still got yelled at ... don't confuse one bad manager with the entire managerial corps of WDW. Really great managers are going to be really great managers whether there's a recession or not. And bad managers will be bad managers, regardless of whether there are cutbacks.

 

[boxer]

On my trip a couple years ago, I saw an older lady COMPLETELY flip-out and berate a CM at Boma's. Her reason-----because she couldn't get a table (no ADR) and felt that because she was staying in the Animal Kingdom, that she was somehow entitled to eat there with no ressie. She even made comments about all the 'kids' in the resturant, and how they should not be allowed in there.

She was a real work of art, LOL. With this being said, there is NO WAY I could be a CM, or envy their jobs what-so-ever. For every good person they deal with, I would bet there are 2-3 idiots like this lady that they are forced to deal with during the day.

 

[graygables]

"This would have never happened pre-recession." Don't be silly. Of course it would have. It's not like all the managers were practically perfect in every way before the recession and then all magically turned into evil stepsisters afterwards. There were rotten managers before the recession, just as there are wonderful magical managers working right now.

I'm a 20+ year CM. And I would ask you to please remember that, just as we ask Guests not to lump all CMs together when they complain, and one poster asks another poster to not lump all "young people" together when they complain, please do not lump all managers together when you complain.

But even if you did follow all the procedures for leaving your area and were only gone five minutes and still got yelled at ... don't confuse one bad manager with the entire managerial corps of WDW. Really great managers are going to be really great managers whether there's a recession or not. And bad managers will be bad managers, regardless of whether there are cutbacks.

THANK YOU for posting this. I completely agree. I would like to add that the statement about CPs making up "most" of the workforce is untrue, they make up about 10% of the CMs at WDW.

Reading the long post reminded me of a situation I had just a few months ago (post-recession, I had VERY few "PG"s, could count on one hand in the 5 months I was on my CP) where a very angry guest came in our retail location demanding that someone from Guest Relations come to him b/c he was NOT going to them. I asked if I could help in any way and he told me that he was trying to get ice cream for his family of 6 on their DDP, but the system was down and the CM at the ODF location wouldn't help. I picked up the phone, called GR and was put through to the resort call center where we got it all worked out. I then walked him out to the ODF location and got the guest his ice cream. By this time, he was amazed that an "ordinary" Cast Member got this fixed fairly easily. He thanked me profusely and went on with his day. I went back in the shop, got the manager to sign some paperwork and settled the accounts with the ODF person. Later, I was called back to the office to the phone to speak with a manager at the guest's resort to give more information so they could deduct the correct credits from his account and to thank me for my assistance. Mind you, I was a College Program participant, nothing special and this took a good 30+ minutes of my day. My manager's looked at it as SOP and didn't blink an eye at any of it.

There are going to be problem managers and problem CMs. I think it's important for Guests to hold us accountable for what we do. Too many times, they just let it go because who wants to deal with that on vacation? If it continues, however, it will become the new normal and your next vacation will be less magical. We depend on you to let us know how we're doing and what we can do to make it right. If we're doing it right, we depend on you for encouragement as well.

 

[WDSearcher]

This makes me so mad--big corporations thinking that the bottom line is everything and losing all their humanity. It makes me want to email/write Disney and remind them very strongly that one big reason we keep going back to WDW is the magic that CMs make. Anyone have the appropriate email address to contact? Maybe if enough of us complain, they'll rethink this cold-hearted policy!

I don't know that you can take one CMs experience as "policy." I work for WDW as well, and am not aware of this "don't leave your station no matter what" policy. I have never had a problem needing to leave where I was in order to help someone -- I just had to be sure that someone knew where I was going and why. And that seems reasonable to me if I'm leaving my area.

This is likely more the problem of a singular manager or a specific department. It is certainly not COMPANY policy.

 

[WDSearcher]

There are going to be problem managers and problem CMs. I think it's important for Guests to hold us accountable for what we do. Too many times, they just let it go because who wants to deal with that on vacation? If it continues, however, it will become the new normal and your next vacation will be less magical. We depend on you to let us know how we're doing and what we can do to make it right. If we're doing it right, we depend on you for encouragement as well.

 

[Ashton7]

I have to agree with the OP that something seems to be going on in the parks. I suspect that it is, as others have suggested, at least partially a product of the current situation in the economy and the country. People are stressed out and tired and worried.

I was at Animal Kingdom last Friday. I went because it was the last day on my seasonal pass before the summer blackout days. I love to do pin trading so that was one of my reasons for going. One of the things I love about pin trading is talking to the CMs. The great majority of them are usually happy to pin trade and a lot of fun to chat with for a few moments. I'm usually very careful about when and how I approach them so I don't interrupt them if they are talking to someone else or working at something. Every once in awhile I've encountered one who seems just totally uninterested in interacting in any way. But this trip to AK was the first time I encountered so many who simply seemed annoyed that I had asked to trade or were "this close" to being outright hostile! In fact, there were several wearing lanyards I started to approach and they gave me such a "look" that I immediately veered away. The culmination of my day was when I approached two DVC salesman who were simply standing off to the side watching people exit an area after a show. They both had on lanyards. I asked them to trade and they did politely show me their lanyards. They did chat with me a moment and were perfectly polite. But one of them noticed an old lady trundling past on a scooter and called out to her "Happy Birthday! Must be your 21st!" She was wearing a Happy Birthday button. As she went on past, the other man said "Yeah, more like her HUNDRED and 21st." I was walking away already at that point and could not believe my ears. I'm overweight so I wondered "Hmmm. Now what are they saying about me?!?" It really left me with a bad feeling.

I realize no one is perfect as others have said but there are things that are appropriate to say in public in the hearing of customers and things that just aren't ...

 

[AmberHeartsDisney]

Just a little story

THANK YOU! I bet that made such a difference in that family's vacation!

 

[Joanna71985]

THANK YOU for posting this. I completely agree. I would like to add that the statement about CPs making up "most" of the workforce is untrue, they make up about 10% of the CMs at WDW.

Reading the long post reminded me of a situation I had just a few months ago (post-recession, I had VERY few "PG"s, could count on one hand in the 5 months I was on my CP) where a very angry guest came in our retail location demanding that someone from Guest Relations come to him b/c he was NOT going to them. I asked if I could help in any way and he told me that he was trying to get ice cream for his family of 6 on their DDP, but the system was down and the CM at the ODF location wouldn't help. I picked up the phone, called GR and was put through to the resort call center where we got it all worked out. I then walked him out to the ODF location and got the guest his ice cream. By this time, he was amazed that an "ordinary" Cast Member got this fixed fairly easily. He thanked me profusely and went on with his day. I went back in the shop, got the manager to sign some paperwork and settled the accounts with the ODF person. Later, I was called back to the office to the phone to speak with a manager at the guest's resort to give more information so they could deduct the correct credits from his account and to thank me for my assistance. Mind you, I was a College Program participant, nothing special and this took a good 30+ minutes of my day. My manager's looked at it as SOP and didn't blink an eye at any of it.

There are going to be problem managers and problem CMs. I think it's important for Guests to hold us accountable for what we do. Too many times, they just let it go because who wants to deal with that on vacation? If it continues, however, it will become the new normal and your next vacation will be less magical. We depend on you to let us know how we're doing and what we can do to make it right. If we're doing it right, we depend on you for encouragement as well.

I agree with all of this. I've been working at Disney on and off for over 4 years now. I can count the amount of "PGs" I've had on 1 hand. The good experiences/guests FAR outweigh the bad ones. I love being a CM. There is nowhere else I would rather work.

 

[eliza61]

My favorite posts are the ones talking about generations gone by and how this one is rude etc. chain, and if customers got rude you were told to ask them to calm down, if they refused you simply t?

I love them too. My usual response is "how did this generation get like that" If this generation is rude, lazy & obnoxious its because our generation did not teach them work ethic, politeness and social skills. Since kids learn what they see and are taught, that doesn't really say alot for all these wonderful previous generations. Of course the Dis is famous for having well behaved kids that never have meltdowns and people who are never in debt.

Any way, after 15 years of going to the world I have seen 10X's as many "guest acting as park apes" then cm's acting badly. If we held the guest up to the same standards we hold the cm's to, the parks would be empty all the time. It's funny because guest always seem to use the excuse "I paid a lot for this trip" like that is some pass for bad behavior.

I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt. I'm not always susy sunshine, so I just assume every one could have a bad day.

 

[meghanet]

I would like to say that my experience is specific to a certain business line, and is not representative of the entire company. I do know managers and areas that are still devoted to the magic. In my area we just had a roundtable when the economy started going down and got told that because of the economy we were no longer allowed to do anything outside of our business line's specific objectives and should refer guests to other CMs in the right area. My manager did not like the fact that he had to get mad at me for what I did, but he knew what the higher ups wanted. The CMs in my area tried to bring it up at multiple roundtables to no avail. Before the recession we were given a free reign and those that were familiar with our business unit thought we had the best job on property, and I agree. I'm just trying to show all sides of the story.

Also, while most of the total CM population are not CPs, most of the onstage, frontline CMs are. Disney doesn't even have enough housing for them anymore and had to coerce some of this last batch to take housing off property. They are going to get more and more CPs because the government subsidizes their pay so the cost on Disney is ridiculously low, plus they get to make money off of their housing. Anytime I worked in merchandise or food and beverage I was surrounded by CPs.

I really wish Disney would raise the bar and only hire people that they can trust to do a good job for the company and the guests. Unfortunately there's been a hiring freeze for awhile so those people who are out of a job and would love to come to Disney and do a good job aren't able to.

As I stated at the beginning of my original post, I speak from my personal experience, not as a representative of the collective CM body. I just wanted to show that you don't know the personal situation behind every CM.

When I visit the parks I'm a kid again, even after working there, and I guarantee every CM I come in contact with can tell how excited and happy I am to be there. That kind of happiness is contagious and maybe that's why I've never really had a bad experience. The only thing I can think of was a CM who was yelling during the seating of Nemo, but the poor guy was going to get trampled and if guests would just use some common sense he wouldn't have had to yell to get his directions heard.

Also, remember that Americans aren't the only people visiting the parks. Many nationalities visit and some are notorious for treating CMs bad. A lot of it is a cultural thing and the way people are raised. I just believe that you can't control or change anyone's behavior but your own, so focus on you. If you do see a negative CM, get a hold of their management or guest relations, or even just talk to the CM. Sometimes a friendly reminder can go a long way! It's easy to get in this bubble when you're feeling pressured or frustrated (running a register with a line out the door will do that to a person) and it just takes a smile, joke, or friendly reminder to bring the CM back to where they are and aware of their surroundings. Outside of CPs, who really are hit or miss, I think most CMs would be upset with themselves if they knew the affect their actions were having on you and your family.

A lot of great points have been brought up on this thread and everyone's viewpoint is valid. You can't argue with how a person feels. I guess it boils down to the fact that life isn't perfect, even when we pay good money to go on vacation. Nothing is going to change that. We can just do our best and hope that others do the same. I do wish Disney did more recognition for good work, I think it would encourage others to stay on their toes and check themselves more often. Again though, I guess it depends on your area. There were areas I worked in that were great at this and others that weren't. Maybe the answer is to get great management and then it will trickle down from there.

 

[meghanet]

I love them too. My usual response is "how did this generation get like that" If this generation is rude, lazy & obnoxious its because our generation did not teach them work ethic, politeness and social skills. Since kids learn what they see and are taught, that doesn't really say alot for all these wonderful previous generations. Of course the Dis is famous for having well behaved kids that never have meltdowns and people who are never in debt.

Any way, after 15 years of going to the world I have seen 10X's as many "guest acting as park apes" then cm's acting badly. If we held the guest up to the same standards we hold the cm's to, the parks would be empty all the time. It's funny because guest always seem to use the excuse "I paid a lot for this trip" like that is some pass for bad behavior.

I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt. I'm not always susy sunshine, so I just assume every one could have a bad day.

Great post, and I LOVE your sig! Completely made my day.

 

[WDSearcher]

I would like to say that my experience is specific to a certain business line, and is not representative of the entire company. I do know managers and areas that are still devoted to the magic. In my area we just had a roundtable when the economy started going down and got told that because of the economy we were no longer allowed to do anything outside of our business line's specific objectives and should refer guests to other CMs in the right area.

I can appreciate where you're coming from, but "no longer allowed to do anything outside of our business line's specific objectives" is not the same thing as "not allowed to help a Guest if I see them fall and drop their ice cream cone". If that's what your manager told you that meant, then there's your problem. At Disney EVERYONE's specific objective is guest service. Now, if you decide to leave your area for an hour to help a guest navigate the Photopass system and you're not a Photopass CM, that's a problem -- that's when you find a Photopass CM and let them take over while you go back to your job. But if you're working the parade route and you see a child trip and fall, going over and getting to a phone or a radio to call First Aid is still part of your job description.

My manager did not like the fact that he had to get mad at me for what I did, but he knew what the higher ups wanted.

He didn't have to get mad. If he thought what you did was acceptable and within the bounds of good Guest Service, then he doesn't get mad at you to please the higher-ups. He commends you for what you did and then takes the lumps himself, if there are any. Him blaming the higher-ups is a cop-out. That's him not willing to stand up for you for doing the right thing. YMMV

I really wish Disney would raise the bar and only hire people that they can trust to do a good job for the company and the guests. Unfortunately there's been a hiring freeze for awhile so those people who are out of a job and would love to come to Disney and do a good job aren't able to.

It's not just the hiring freeze though. Have you ever worked in Casting? People do NOT behave on the job the way they behave in interviews! People are on their best Disney behavior during an interview, but then end up being terrible employees. And there's no way to find out whether they live up to their interview until you hire them and put them on stage. Disney doesn't knowingly hire people who they think are going to fail them. Why would they? But in an interview, no one is going to say, "No, I will not give good guest service."

I just believe that you can't control or change anyone's behavior but your own, so focus on you. If you do see a negative CM, get a hold of their management or guest relations, or even just talk to the CM. Sometimes a friendly reminder can go a long way! It's easy to get in this bubble when you're feeling pressured or frustrated (running a register with a line out the door will do that to a person) and it just takes a smile, joke, or friendly reminder to bring the CM back to where they are and aware of their surroundings.

Totally agree. This is absolutely correct!

Again though, I guess it depends on your area. There were areas I worked in that were great at this and others that weren't. Maybe the answer is to get great management and then it will trickle down from there.

Most of the great managers I know at WDW have been there for decades and started as characters or entry-level merch or parade dancers. They grew up with the company. Too many managers now come straight from college, looking only for a resume credit before they move on. You need the people who start here and stay here.

 

[Buzz Litebeer]

Not sure if this is the right board....
I just got back and while I had an amazing time I am slightly disturbed.
On three different occasions in different parks I witnessed cast members either arguing with each other or talking about work loudly in front of guests.

Speaking as a current front-line CM, what you experienced should not be typical and should not have happened. You have my apologies.

with over 60,000 employees and most born way after "Walt" it is just a job to them, much like working at Wal-Mart and Disney does a very poor job of training seasonal CMs now.

Speaking as a former trainer: How, exactly, is Disney doing a poor job training new CMs? You made the statement; I'd like specific examples.

This is my first trip during summer months and there were a lot of new CM's.

And THIS is why you experienced what you did. I'm willing to bet dollars to doughnuts that each of the CMs you saw have been with the company for less than a month.

Now, this in no way means that Disney is doing a poor job training these new CMs. However, for many of those kids, working at WDW is their first job.

Unfortunately, for the OP the manager should have been nearby and corrected the situation. That is where the real problem lies.

Well, managers can't be everywhere. I don't blame them, I don't blame the trainers; I blame the CMs.

see this is what i'm talking about - it is totally unprofessional for a cm to bad mouth managers be it true or not.

it makes the cm look bad.

Pretty much. No matter what kind of day I may be having, I refuse to badmouth my fellow cast or my employer to Guests onstage. The closest I'll come to doing so is to tell Guests who ask, "It takes a certain kind of person to work here. It's not for everyone, and not everyone who gets hired is that kind of person."

Do you think Walt would agree with this statement?

Sadly, the prevailing attitude I've seen among the executives is "Well, Walt's been dead for over 40 years."

 

[declansdad]

Sorry, but I thought it was obvious what I meant by this . I mean all day, every day dealing with a constant flow of many different people. On the front line. There is a difference between that and say, an accountant or someone working in an office job similar to that.

Sorry, it wasn't obvious to me and even now that you explained it, I still don't agree with you.

 

[declansdad]

I think I am the one being quite sensible. Working with the public is not an easy occupation. I am talking about REAL situations, and I am talking from experience. I work in adult education, which is close to the "general public", and I have had to deal with unwanted advances, my life being threatened, and verbal abuse from people who don't get what they THINK they deserve.And these are from people who are in a university setting where you think that they could control themselves and act like decent human beings. Are you talking about being sensible in that respect??? It has been my experience that some vacationers see CM's as servants, and there just to PLEASE them. This is not true! Although they are in the service industry, they may have a job that DOES NOT include catering to every whim of the vacationer. All I am saying, is give the CM's some respect and understanding. Let's talk about some empathy here. I know that word means pretty much zilch to many people today, but let's bring it back into our vocabulary.

I work in the same industry that you do and I can honestly say that in over 15 years, I haven't run across the problems that you seem to have.

I don't think that you shoud treat a CM or any person that serves the public as a servant. Nor do I believe that they should cater to every whim of the customer. I also believe the vast majority of customers feel the same way.

When a customer is rude and crude, a CM shouldn't return the sentiment in the same manner but they don't have to take it either. What the OP mentioned was the behaviour of SOME CMs, not all. The OP wasn't talking about rude customers but rather CMs that were not serving their customers in a manner that the customers were entitled to. And yes they were entitled to be treated properly because they paid for service. If a person cannot provide that service, they are in the wrong line of work.

 

[caseybruna]

I work in the same industry that you do and I can honestly say that in over 15 years, I haven't run across the problems that you seem to have.

I don't think that you shoud treat a CM or any person that serves the public as a servant. Nor do I believe that they should cater to every whim of the customer. I also believe the vast majority of customers feel the same way.

When a customer is rude and crude, a CM shouldn't return the sentiment in the same manner but they don't have to take it either. What the OP mentioned was the behaviour of SOME CMs, not all. The OP wasn't talking about rude customers but rather CMs that were not serving their customers in a manner that the customers were entitled to. And yes they were entitled to be treated properly because they paid for service. If a person cannot provide that service, they are in the wrong line of work.

Well consider yourself lucky that you have not run into these problems?? For people, like myself, who have suffered the wrath of ridiculous people year after year, its pretty offensive to hear someone say basically that we should basically sit down and shut up. I mean, you say that people providing these services are entitled to not have to take when a customer is rude and crude, but somehow the rest of your discussion indicates otherwise. How are we supposed to effectively provide our service ("just do our job") when we are often being treated very poorly by some individuals??

Now I agree with you that those who treat CMs with respect (the majority) should receive the high level of service CMs are supposed to give, but you cant simplify the process into one that paints customer service workers (the way in which i explained in my prior post, just to be clear ) as should be automated robots. its more complex than that.

The fact that you don't seem to have had any of the bad experiences some posters have commented on means that you wouldn't know what it feels like to suffer from much customer/client abuse. Would you be able to smile and put on a brave face from clock on to clock off in these conditions? I very much doubt you would... And I don't think I know anyone would be able to, at least with out cracking big time at some stage...

What I have said it not to be used as some blanket excuse for all less than desriable CM behaviour but more to put things in contxt and suggest that sparing a thought for the CMs is not such a bad idea..

 

[caseybruna]

Any way, after 15 years of going to the world I have seen 10X's as many "guest acting as park apes" then cm's acting badly. If we held the guest up to the same standards we hold the cm's to, the parks would be empty all the time. It's funny because guest always seem to use the excuse "I paid a lot for this trip" like that is some pass for bad behavior.

I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt. I'm not always susy sunshine, so I just assume every one could have a bad day.

my thoughts exactly