Loading ...We took some friends to a new restaurant and I noticed the waiter taking our order carried a spoon in his shirt pocket. When the busboy brought our water and utensils, he also had a spoon in his shirt pocket. Then I looked around and saw that all the staff had spoons in their pockets.
This seemed a little strange, so when the waiter came back to serve our soup I inquired, ‘Why the spoon?’
He explained,’Well, the owner hired a consulting firm to revamp all of our processes. After several months of analysis, they concluded that the spoon was the most frequently dropped utensil, with a drop frequency of approximately three spoons per table per hour. If our personnel are better prepared, we can reduce the number of trips back to the kitchen and save 15 man-hours per shift.’
As luck would have it, I dropped my spoon and he replaced it with his spare. ‘I’ll get another spoon next time I go to the kitchen instead of making an extra trip to get it now.’
I was impressed. I also noticed that the waiter had a string hanging out of his fly. Looking around, I saw that all of the waiters had a string hanging from their flies.
So before the waiter walked off, I said, ‘Excuse me, but can you tell me why you have that string right there?’
Lowering his voice. he said, ‘Not everyone is so observant. The consulting firm also determined how we could save time in the restroom. By tying this string to the tip of our you-know-what, we can pull it out without touching it and thus, eliminate the need to wash our hands, shortening the time spent in the restroom by 76.39%.
I asked quietly, ‘After you get it out, how do you put it back?’
‘Well,’ he whispered, ‘I don’t know about the others, but I use the spoon.