Enforced cheerfulness $FAIL

[firecat]

I was in Walgreen's just now, and the cashier was wearing a button front and center on her uniform that said "Is my smile a 9?"

I assume that she had to wear it. I was tempted to ask, but I didn't want to waste her time because there was a long line. It made me furious on her behalf. If your policy is that employees should act friendly, I suppose there's nothing I can do about that, but I really don't like requiring employees to wear buttons that invite the customer to police their behavior (behavior that has nothing to do with whether they're doing the work of cashiering correctly).

Comments

[mama-hogswatch.livejournal.com]

I do perceive it as part of my job to pretend to be cheerful when I'm dealing with the public.

I do it when I teach, too.

Yes, it's draining as hell, but for the most part I find the financial rewards worth being an actor. In part, I feel like I'm kinda being paid to pretend to like people, but I guess I don't feel like it's wrong.

[firecat]

I agree with you and I do the same myself. But choosing to do it for yourself and and being required by your company to wear a sign are at different ends of a spectrum of personal agency.

In the middle of the spectrum are various other ways a company might require an employee to behave.

I think being required to wear a sign is wrong. Or to put it in a more relativistic fashion, it seriously turns me off and makes me want to avoid doing business with the company.

[mama-hogswatch.livejournal.com]

Yes, I agree the sign is going too far.