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NEGATIVE ATTITUDE POSITIVE ATTITUDE
Those dumb kids don’t
Because of these kids’
know what they want.
inexperience, I can see the
importance of my services.
Don’t bother me!
May I help you?
If you have a negative attitude toward your job, have
you stopped to ask yourself why, and what can be done
about it? Consider the following examples:
Are you in a job that doesn’t fully challenge you.
Do you have too much time on your hands? Use this
time as an opportunity to sharpen your skills to
better serve at your particular contact point. You
may even start looking at the demands of jobs that
are more responsible. Tolay’s Navy is becoming
smaller; and along with that, the number of people
who are willing to do more than the bare minimum
is becoming smaller. Those who are willing to do
more are far from being suckers. They are special
in the sense that they obtain satisfaction from doing
their job well.
Do you view your job as being routine? Do you
think it offers no challenge? If either is true, research
the overall purpose or objective of your job to see
how it fits into the mission of your activity or
command. You will not only gain an appreciation
for the importance of your job, you may qualify
yourself for a more responsible position.
If you are job dissatisfied, look around for a job
you would prefer. The next step would be to qualify
yourself for that job. To illustrate this fact, supply
was fortunate to have a conscientious SKSN. He
had mastered several rather complex accounting
procedures through research, practice, and personal
guidance. Because of his initiative, when the SK1
assigned to the accounting department was
transferred, the SKSN was immediately assigned
his duties. The SKSN saw the job as a challenge and
worked hard to get it—so can you.
Regardless of how you answered these questions,
you will nevertheless communicate your attitude toward
your job to your customers. Your customers will quickly
sense your attitude from your speech and manner.
TOWARD THE CUSTOMER.— Your attitude
toward the customer relates closely to your attitude
toward your job. The customer quickly senses your
attitude from your speech and manner.
Have you ever ignored customers when they
entered your office to try to impress them with how
important or how busy you were? Were the customers
impressed? No doubt! But, not as you may have
expected. They were probably more impressed with
your lack of concern for their needs.
When a customer comes to you for help, a perceived
level of confidence in your ability to provide it already
exists. Offensive language or a superior attitude will
quickly undermine this confidence.
“Speaking down” implies that you consider the
customer to be less than your equal. That attitude may
make the customer feel that the service you provide is
less than your best. The language you use can give the
impression that you are speaking down, so avoid using
language that might be unfamiliar to customers. You
need to know what language to use, when to use it, and
how to use it. When engineering or deck division
personnel come into the office for information, you must
use words they can understand.
We will speak more about stereotyping later but for
now, we want to issue a word of caution about its effect
on the customer. Stereotyping is the practice of fitting
people and things into preconceived molds. For Navy
members, it is also the practice of fitting members of
ratings or occupations into an established “norm.” The
fallacy of this practice is that hardly anyone fits into that
norm. The best way to avoid stereotyping is to recognize
the contribution each rating makes to the Navy. True, a
person outside your rating may not understand every
aspect of your specialty; but how proficient are you in
that person’s specialty?
Try to identify whether you have the habit of
stereotyping your customers. Then take steps to
overcome that habit. Though you may not be aware of
the habit, the CUSTOMER IS AWARE OF IT.
TOWARD THE CUSTOMERS’ NEEDS.— The
customers’ needs will span the continuum from the
ridiculous, through the routine, to the difficult.
However, these categories reflect your opinion of the
needs and requests—not the customers’. These needs,
requests, and problems are important to customers;
otherwise, they would not be there.
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