Controling your financial destiny · Return to Your Real Self

Controling your financial destiny

This is a "chapter" from my book, Life: It's a Trip.

I worked in restaurants for many, many years, and my favorite part was being a waiter. Being a waiter allowed me the flexibility of scheduling that I didn’t have when I worked as a manager. And I enjoyed the fact that for the most part, I controlled my income by taking care of my customers.

Let me share two stories from when I worked at Steak and Ale to illustrate my point.

One night, as I was going about my shift taking care of my customers, one customer surprised me with the question, “Did you use to work at Atchafalaya’s?” “Yes”, I said. “That was three years ago.” “That’s right”, he said. “And you waited on us one time. That was the best service I had ever received. From now on, I am going to ask for you every time I come here.”

I thanked him for the compliment and for remembering me. He took care of me very well that day.

About a week later, I got a phone call at home from the restaurant manager. He told me that some guy called and said he was bringing in some business clients the next day and wanted me to wait on them. The manager told him that it was my day off and I wouldn’t be in, but he will have the best waiter take care of him. The man said, “No. Will you please call Rasheed and see if he can come in to wait on me, and call me back?” I knew who it was. I went in, worked for an hour off the clock to take care of my customer and made $50.00. That was in 1996.

When I said I controlled my income, for the most part, incidents like this were a part of it. The other part is the fact that when your customers are asking for you, the management tends to give you the best stations to work and make sure that you are making enough money to stick around.

There is another aspect of it, as well. You become the best waiter, the one that is assigned to special customers.

One night, the manager took me aside and told me, “A couple is coming in at seven o’clock and it is the lady’s birthday tomorrow, but the gentleman has to be out of town, so he wants to surprise her. I have set up a table in the back room for them. They want to be left alone but have a memorable experience. Take care of it.”

It was a memorable experience for me, as well. It was the first time I had the opportunity to articulate my philosophy of work.

On one of the visits to their table, the lady wanted to ask me a question. She said she likes what she does but hates working for her boss. She also had interest in horses and her husband was encouraging her to go into business for herself, so her question to me was, “If you had a chance to work for yourself, what would you do?”

I told her that I have always worked for myself. That confused her, given the fact that I was working at the restaurant. So, I explained. I work at the restaurant. The restaurant and I have an agreement and an understanding of sorts. I would show up on certain days, at certain times, and perform certain tasks for and on behalf of the restaurant. In return, the restaurant pays me a small wage and provides an opportunity to earn more money in the form of tips and I have a certain amount of flexibility in scheduling.

If I am not performing to their expectations, they can terminate me, but if they are not meeting my needs to my satisfaction, then I can terminate them and offer my services to someone else, and I have. Be the best at what you do and take pride in your work and money will never be a problem.

She wanted to know how I got to be so wise. I told her that I went to the School of Hard Knocks.

There was something else that I learned that night that was influential in the way I think now. While I considered the customers at the restaurant as MY customers, the truth was that I had only ONE customer, namely, the restaurant where I worked.

If you are an employee, you are, in fact, in a service business. You provide your service to your employer. It may be in the form of time, or it may be in the form of expertise, but you are exchanging value for value. You are getting paid for what you have to offer, and your employer is your ONLY customer.

Any business that relies on only one customer for all its revenue is a risky business. There is no security in it. Smart businesses always diversify and have multiple profit centers.

How many customers can you serve?

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