Posts Tagged ‘Perception’
One’s destination
Posted on: June 2, 2012
One’s destination is never a place, but a new way of seeing things.
Henry Miller
Kaleidoscope
Posted on: February 27, 2011
- In: My Poetry
- 2 Comments
the old lady with the emerald green eyes looked at me;
so what say you child about the expansion of the Universe?
tell me, what do you see?
I see..
a color spectrum of circumstances
scattered, but held by an inexplicable design
gems of space, jewels of time,
a myriad of possibilities down the line
with a tilt, what once was a flower
becomes the shape of a star;
mesmerized by the illusion
that anything is far
perhaps
the Universe is expanding
at a speed outside my understanding
but beauty is elusive
the slightest change of direction
a minor movement of will
a single droplet of dreams
and the patchwork is bound to burst
at the seams
* The first part is actually a true story, and the second part was inspired by my Italian kaleidoscope. I don’t know if the parts actually belong together or if this poem is even done. It has a few alternative versions but I’ll leave it as it is for now.
Looking at the stars
Posted on: September 6, 2010
We are all in the gutter,
but some of us are looking at the stars
Oscar Wilde
I studied tourism and service management, a definition hard to clarify. The tourism industry IS the largest industry of the world (according to the World Bank) and the most important source of income for many countries, primarily underdeveloped ones. Within that industry (don’t you just hate that world) there are innumerable people in innumerable positions. But somehow, when you say you work with tourism most people instantly perceive the idea of a guide or a travel agent.
I’ve tried both and it’s not my thing.
When I applied for my school in Båstad I had just been out backpacking in Australia and I thought to myself: I love traveling. I could work and make a living out of this! The truth is, it’s not that easy. Arranging, operating, marketing and selling travels is a completely different thing than experiencing them yourself. Service, is even more tricky. Many people think service is all about smiling and being polite, but the same attitude that work so well in one situation can have the opposite effect if say, you’re in Thailand and you’re complaining to the front desk for the fifth time that you’re air con isn’t working and the personnel greets you with a smile saying; “yes, sir, we fix”.
Service is a complex art.
It is about understanding someone else’s needs (the need being the gap between the actual scenario and the dream scenario), not from your own reference point, but putting yourself in someone else’s shoes (having no idea where they’ve been and how far they’ve gone to get there ) and committing, not to your assumption of the promise, but of THEIR expectations on you (based on many previous experiences and factors) Furthermore, if you want to make an impression (so that they will actually experience “good service”), you need to exceed those expectations, and that, after a fifteen hours shift of complaints, confusion and stress, when you really just want to “shut off” your channel.
Being perceptive is the key to providing good service. In fact, if you look up the word “perceptive” in a thesaurus you get a description of what we often refer to as “service minded”:
Alert, aware, insightful, keen, knowing, observant, rational, responsive and wise.
Perception is my thing.
You see, I may not be the quickest co-worker in a group of staff. But I ALWAYS put people first.
I may not know my role yet within this massive machinery of people and services but I know, whatever I do, I am learning AND teaching. I am giving AND receiving. And yes, I smile too.
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