Working Well: When holidays present rude customers, taking breaks and the high road preserve peace

NEW YORK (AP) — The December holidays are supposed to be a time of joyful celebration, but the season can be especially grueling for the millions of people who work in retail stores, staff airline counters and field complaints coming into call centers.

Instead of compassion or good cheer, service sector workers often encounter rude behavior from frazzled shoppers, irate customers demanding instant satisfaction and travelers fuming about flight delays and cancellations. And they must do their jobs to the mind-numbing soundtrack of nonstop Christmas music.

“Something happens around November and people just forget their manners,” Kathryn Harper, senior bookseller at New York bookstore McNally Jackson, said. “Please and thank you go a huge way. Being rude to us or snippy to us is not going to make us go any faster. It’s not going to make the thing that’s out of stock magically appear.”

Harper joined other members of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union last month for a virtual news conference where they made a plea for the public's patience and self-control during the hectic weeks ahead.

“There’s a lot of disgruntled attitudes flying around this time of the year,” Cynthia Russo, who has worked at Bloomingdale’s in Manhattan for nearly two decades, said. “I try to kill them with kindness, but yet I take a firm stand with not being abused verbally, because that can happen and it’s sad. My favorite line is, ‘Let’s start over.'"

Dealing with a difficult person is never easy. These are other strategies that veteran workers use to defuse tense situations and to preserve their own peace of mind.

Schedule sanity

Taking a break for five or 10 minutes can help a worker who got yelled at to reset emotionally. If long lines or other duties don't allow for stepping away in the moment, the rattled employee could ask a colleague to take over temporarily or inform a manager of a need for a brief respite.

Fitting exercise into the day is hard in any line of work, but retail workers put in long hours during the holidays, making it even more challenging. Russo tries to power walk around each floor of Bloomingdale’s twice a day.

“I know I look crazy, probably, but I think my coworkers are used to seeing me do it,” she said.

At Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport, Nicole Ray escorts passengers who need wheelchair assistance safely make it to their planes and back. She feels panicky when there aren’t enough wheelchairs or attendants to get the job done during busy periods.

The travelers she helps are kind for the most part, Ray says, but someone treats her with disrespect at least once a day. Such interactions often leave her in tears, she says. With two sons at home and extra side jobs to pay the bills, she has few opportunities to decompress.

If there's time between airport passengers, Ray escapes to a parking garage to breathe and listen to music. She copes with the unpleasant attitudes she comes across by expressing gratitude to friendly patrons, telling them “I really appreciate you being such a joy to be around and not being so hard on me."

Don’t take it personally

Staying calm in the face of an irrational customer can be challenging, but remembering that another person's unreasonable demands are not a reflection of you makes it easier to react skillfully.

“You have to understand that if people are impatient or they’re not in a good mood, obviously it has nothing to do with you," Tina Minshall, who is general manager at the Bridal and Formal shop in Cincinnati, said. “If you can respond in a pleasant way, it tends to de-elevate whatever is going on around you.”

Instead of reciprocating someone’s misplaced anger, try to be the one who remains composed, said Justin Robbins, founder of Metric Sherpa, a research and advisory firm that coaches businesses on training front-line employees.

You can say, “I’m here to help you resolve this,” or “I want to help you, but we need to keep this conversation respectful,” he said.

Maintaining an even keel can be especially difficult in customer call centers, where the pace of incoming complaints during the holidays is relentless and agents are often treated like punching bags.

Listening with empathy, without interrupting, goes a long way, said Melissa Copeland, founder and principal of Illinois-based Blue Orbit Consulting, which helps companies improve their customer service experience. After listening, repeat back what you’ve heard and explain the process you'll follow. Commit to what you can control, she said.

Smiling during tense interactions can make a difference. “It relaxes your face, and if you try and say something angry or be obnoxious while you’re smiling, it’s hard to do,” Copeland said. “It just helps with a quick reset.”

Focus on small joys

A sense of humor is a professional skill to cultivate during the holidays, said Carol Price, who has sold books, clothes and vitamins at shops in Fort Smith, Arkansas, for decades while holding down a full-time job at the local water agency. When the Christmas music in the stores where she works feels relentless and grates on her nerves, she sings along, sometimes changing the lyrics to “meow”.

Some customers hug Price when she helps them find what they need. By contrast, a man once threw books at her. She chooses to focus on the former.

“There’s nothing better than a kid asking for a book, and finding that book and handing it to them and seeing that look on their face,” Price said.

Supervisors can help lighten the emotional burden that comes with customer relations by giving employees to small treats, according to Harper, the New York bookseller. “You can’t pizza party your way up to worker protections, but it helps during holidays,” she said.

Stephen Yalof, CEO of shopping center operator Tanger, said managers also can work to reduce the stress on shoppers. Managers at Tanger's outlet malls and open-air centers use $25 gift cards to surprise customers or placate disgruntled ones.

“You’d be shocked what a gift card does to defuse a potential issue really quickly,” Yalof said.

Organize

If working conditions are unbearable, employees can band together to request improvements. Laura Kelly, an unaccompanied minor escort and wheelchair attendant with Prospect Airport Services, earns $12.50 an hour working at Charlotte Douglas International Airport and lives in a hotel with her two adult children.

During the holidays, there are more passengers to help but fewer workers because many quit or call in sick, Kelly said. She recently participated in a one-day Thanksgiving week strike to protest low wages.

“I’m just trying to help people get to where they need to go and just to keep a roof over my kids' heads and food in their belly,” Kelly said. “I don’t even have a way to relieve stress besides making sure that my kids are taken care of."

Her advice to customers is to remember that service workers are human too.

“Just be loving and caring and put yourself in our place,” Kelly said. ”Just imagine if we were the passenger and you were pushing us around.”

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Do you have a workplace story to share? Have you overcome an obstacle or made a profound change in your job? Send your questions and story ideas to workingwell@ap.org.