When A Description Is Too Accurate….Or Why People Need A Filter On Their Mouths

Here’s a quick nasty customer story: I am a hair stylist, and my salon is in a popular shopping center so we get a lot of walk-ins, so sometimes when those walk-ins want to return they forget the name of the stylist they saw (even though it is on a business card we hand you, but things get lost). A woman called for me, trying to say the blonde girl. Well, there are a lot of us blondes here, she needed to be more specific, what part of the salon was she seated at the first time, we all have assigned spots, then we can identify your stylist. She says, “I sat at such and such part and that she was kind of fat. Not obese, but a chubby or chunky kind of girl.” Not only that, my manager told me exactly how the customer described me. I don’t know who is worse, the customer for being rude or my manager for repeating it!! I tacked on an extra color charge, which normally I won’t do, as I clearly need the extra money to feed my face. 1031-13

Your manager utterly lacked any discretion in passing on the information to you. What purpose does it serve for you to have known that much detail the customer used to figure out which stylist she was remembering? People need to think about the consequences of their choice of words and if those words will edify or tear down the hearer. A gracious and professional manager would have listened to the customer, figured out which stylist it was, mentally edited out the non too flattering description and merely informed you of the appointment details.

The question should be, “Who is being served by passing on that information?” And if the answer is, “Gee, that would be me because I’m going to get some kind of freaky thrill watching someone else get offended or hurt,” then you (generic) need to consider your motives for blabbering details that serve no useful purpose.