dear johnny

dear johnny,

other day,  we sent you off on your own, for the first time ever to complete an estimate.  you see, we did this because we believe in your abilities. 

you are a hardworking young man and you deserve a shot at many things.

you walked into the estimate confident, ready to make the prospective client happy.

you were prepared to take photos, measure linear feet and draw out a design plan so we can send it to the customer and discuss our high end permanent lighting system.

you were presented with a ton of questions, not all of which you could answer immediately and then were abruptly dismissed and asked to leave the customer’s property.

you called your team lead in disappointment and expressed remorse, your first customer meeting was a fail and you feared you let us down.

you went on to work the rest of the day in the scorching heat and ended your day at 1130 pm, on a Friday.  You maintained a positive attitude  and you sour ream like the true team player you are.

at the end of the night, when you were on your way home, after working such a long day, you called to apologize for the estimate being a bust.

you were so sincere. you were so concerned.

so thing is johnny, you did not fail us. you did not disappoint us. you did your best and you tried. you absolutely could have killed that estimate. you are more than capable. 

sometimes, people have a bad day, sometimes, they need an outlet for other issues they are dealing with. 

to be fair, sometimes, people, us, we fail. but this is not what happened in this case. You did not fail.

you were failed by us, and we are sorry.  we should have and could have prepared you better.  we will.

for customers that cannot treat our teams with dignity and compassion, we will not work with them. we will find a way to tell them, thanks but not thanks.

because though we believe our customers and prospective customers deserve the best in service and communication, there is certainly room for grace and failure within our teams.

not everyone understands this or agrees and that is okay.

so johnny-thank you for all you do, your hard work, your commitment and your willingness to do better.  you did not fail and we are not disappointed in you. we are proud of the discipline you exercised by having another man demean you, for no reason at all.

thanks johnny.  we appreciate you and we hope you know it.