Re: Changing the Standard: Success Through Rudeness

An almost on-topic observation about restaurants: there's one here in Boston, been around since 1827, and is famous for, as Wikipedia puts it, "The service is also a partial hold-over from the time of its founding as the waitstaff have been encouraged to adopt a "surly" attitude and "backtalk" the clientele."

Yep, 180 years of bad service.

The last time I was there, the waitress didn't say a word, and set everything down juuuuuuust out of reach. She was definitely enjoying herself.

You have to stand in line, because they don't take reservations -- yet serve 1500 people/day. Count on a couple of hours for lunch.

You have to sit on uncomfortable wooden benches at communal tables, always elbow-to-elbow with strangers. It's almost painfully loud.

They only take cash.

Kind of interesting -- only 4 or 5 head chefs since they were founded. (I know for a fact that there had only been 3 up until 1985.)

Did I mention that they've been around since 1827? And that you have to wait a very long time to be one of over a dozen hundred people to pay cash to sit on an uncomfortable bench with strangers to be served by rude people?

So anyway, not to belabor the point, there are a lot of routes to success.

I'm also reminded in a little more on-topic-y way of a saying we had in the software business: shipping is a feature. There's no such thing as perfect software, so at a certain point, get it out the door. I've heard at least one giant in our field saying that he had to ship the version they knew had bugs -- so that he could keep the cash flow up while they fixed the bugs! They had revenue targets to hit, and there were genuinely dire consequences to innocent children if things didn't keep moving.

The same may be true in your own business.

Which is to say, there are budgets, calendars, and reality. Pick two.

(I just made that up, and am inordinately pleased with myself.)

Of course, I have a t-shirt from Aron's Records, one of the finest retail establishments to ever grace this earth. It says, "Fast. Friendly. Service. Pick one."