Apologize. Remove. Replace.

"Paul, Henry says there is something is wrong with his pork," Kristian said while handing me Henry's plate.

Henry is a chef and owner of my favorite restaurants. I still had to taste it. I did. And it was off, slightly. Most people probably would not have noticed. But it was wrong. I was suitably and horribly embarrassed. I apologized to Henry, got him a different meal and talked to the cooks.

Fast forward three weeks. I'm having a rough day. I closed the pub (working, not drinking) last night, got to bed around 2:30 and got up today at 6:30 to take my wife to the doctor to get a spinal injection of steroids (we had a car accident three and half months ago; she still suffers from a great deal of neck and back pain). I took her home, put her in bed and headed back to the pub to do the books and make a wine order. by the time I am done with that, around 11:30, I am dragging. Not enough sleep and still too much day ahead. I need a pick me up.

I head over to Henry's restaurant. a steaming bowl of his soup calls to my soul. I order a cup of tea and my soup and start writing on my over-size legal pad while I wait. I notice a gentleman eating his soup and scrolling through his smart phone. He stops. Calls the waitress over. Says something quietly to her. She walks over to Henry, who is seated at the bar doing paperwork, and Henry walks over. The gentleman shows Henry a shrimp. Pushes it at Henry as if saying, "Here, give it a try." As if anyone wants to taste an undercooked or bad shrimp. Henry takes the shrimp in his hand, grabs the soup bowl in the other and goes to the kitchen. Five minutes later the gentleman has a new bowl of soup.

Did this make me feel better about Henry getting a bad piece of pork? Of course not. It should never happen.

But it does happen. Everywhere. Imperfection is the perfect condition of the human race. No matter how we strive, no matter how many systems we put in place, no matter how many checks and balances, we will fail. Mistakes will happen. We will dissapoint ourselves and others. It's the next step that determines the reach of our success.

Henry nailed it. He got to the bad shrimp table in about fifteen seconds. He immediately got the offending dish off the table. He got the customer a replacement dish. The customer looked happy throughout the rest of the meal.

I assume Henry said what I would say in the same situation: I'm sorry. This should never happen. Let me take that for you. Would you like the same thing or would you like to see the menu to pick something else. Your lunch, including beverages and dessert, is on me.

It's a darn simple formula-- apologize, remove, replace. In the case of a restaurant, where the cost of any one meal is fairly immaterial, it should also be comped. Other businesses operate with different costs and only need to do the first three: apologize, remove, replace. If those three things are done, the customer doesn't usually mind paying.

What should never ever never absolutely should not happen in any way shape or form is excuses or blaming. The customer does not care whose fault it is. They just want a tasty dish. All the excuses in the world do not change the taste of a bad meal. Blaming the kitchen or the cook does not make the food better. It sounds weak. And in my case with the pork (or, I think Henry would agree in his case with the shrimp), it's my responsibility-- I own the restaurant. I own that pork, I employ that cook. I should have made sure it did not go out.

Blaming and excuses always sound weak. They should be avoided. A strong "I'm sorry. Let me take care of that." goes a lot further with the customer. It allows the customer to put the trust back into you.

And that's where we need to get. A corrected mistake can win the customer back. The customer then knows that under all circumstances he/she will be taken care of. It's about turning a mistake into a victory.

'cause they are going to happen. To all of us.

If They Ask You To Leave

"I'm going to give you one more chance to get in your friends car and leave," said Officer Ron.

It had started fifteen minutes earlier. A customer, let's call him Jeff, had gone from customer to problem customer to super-idiot problem in a flash. Might has well have given Jeff a cape and a tights because he changed like Superman in a phone booth. It fades whatever he did to get asked to leave the bar. It had to be something big and loud because this was Friday night at Lyon's Pub in the summer. It was still light outside but it was late enough that the Pub was transitioning from laid back afternoon hangout to Friday night dance club meat market. Lumpy was on the DJ board and I was behind the bar with two other bartenders.

Jeff did something. He swore at somebody. Or he touched someone wrong. Servers, rightly, do not tolerate being manhandled. It was enough that we had a bouncer come over and ask him to leave. Jeff argued a bit but not much. His friend helped convince him to leave. It's in the parking lot that super-hero jerk face appeared.

Jeff decided to make his stand in the middle of the Lyons Pub parking lot. He just stopped in the middle of the lot and refused to get into his friend's car. He started yelling.

He yelled about his rights.

He yelled about us being assholes.

He yelled at people going into Lyons Pub that they shouldn't.

No one cared. Except for his friend who was really trying to get Jeff into the car. We only cared because Jeff was blocking the parking lot. And really noisy. It was too light outside, being summer and all, for us to carry him into the bushes. So we had no choice-- we called Johnny Law.

The beat cops, Officer Ron and Officer Jon, were there in seconds. They were pretty relaxed. It was summer. It was nice. They had a good job that night. They just had to wander Grand Ave and keep trouble at bay which they accomplished by just being there and talking to waitresses and the cuter customers. They really did not want deal with this. Ramsey County lock-up is not nearly as attractive on a June night as Grand Ave.

Officer Jon stood to the side. Officer Ron tried to talk Jeff down. He asked Jeff to get in his friends car. He explained that if he got in the car and left everything would be forgotten. He encouraged Jeff to get in the car and drive away.

Jeff just kept going. It was free speech this and the bar was wrong that and no one could make him leave that this was America.

Officer Ron explained private property and leaving quietly. He asked Jeff to leave three times. Then he gave his last warning. It was really gentle in the face of super-idiot problem Jeff.

"I'm going to give you one more chance to get in your friends car and leave here," said Officer Ron.

Jeff yelled some more. He screamed about God and country, the founding fathers and the bill of rights.

Ron gave some kind of super secret signal to Officer Jon. A signal that indicates we are moving away from beauty to something uglier but we appear to have no choice . Officer Jon, all 6'5'' work-out buffness of him, did one of those fast cop moves wherein Jeff went from super-idiot to super-apologetic idiot cuffed face down on the front of a squad car.

"I'll leave now," Jeff said. Very meekly and not so loud.

"Once we touch you we have to write a report. And if we have to write a report you're going to detox," said Officer Ron.

Off Jeff went to spend a beautiful June weekend in Ramsey Detox. Hope he enjoyed his grilled cheese.

Jeff did one, relatively, small dumb thing. Then he rolled the multiplier dice. Whatever he did in the bar, I cannot remeber what it was (although jeff probably can), it was dumb. But it was small dumb. He was asked to leave the bar. He was not touched. The police were not involved. He could have left and it all would have been forgotten. In the parking lot, even after officers Ron and Jon arrived, Jeff was given the option to leave. He didn't. He let one small bad choice roll into a huge mistake.

Life is like that for all of us. We all do dumb things. It's just the nature of being human. Some we do through carelessness, some we do through thoughtlessness, some through laziness and some maybe just cause. But almost always we have the choice to make it better or make it worse. The quality of our life is directly related to how often we decide to make it better.

Often times it as simple as walking away when someone asks us to leave. How many disagreements would de-escalate with just a little space and time; some room to breathe and really think about we are saying or doing. Some time to get our ego out of the way.

I can hear my wife nodding her head and yelling "Yes" right now.

In the Beginning

What If You Wrote a Self-Help Book For Yourself?

It did not start with that question. That question was a good 14 hours in the future. No, it started on the Highland Executive 9 at 6:30 am Sunday. At Highland, and afterwards at the New Louisana Cafe, I talked about visualization and life coaching. Ben and Tom started running with it and by the end of breakfast I had a shell of a concept for a self-help book.

I started talking about it with my wife Beth, friends Steve and Jess at First Avenue before the Old 97's show. We were laughing but I was already getting more serious about doing it. I pulled out my iphone and jotted some notes. By the start of the music I had headings for seven chapters and a tentative first line: "What if you wrote a self-help book for yourself?"

Beth said,"Hey, you're just writing down what I say." She's right. And that just gave me chapter eight: "Listen to your wife." She also gave me the idea of taking it from a bartender's point of view. I have been bartending for twenty plus years so that makes a lot of sense. It's also a great marketing hook. Thanks love.

So here I go. The blog is the marketing tool for the un-written book. It's the start of writing the book. It's a test area. And it's free to all of you gentle readers. Enjoy.