F.I.T.Y.F.I

F.I.T.Y.F.I

I had no idea that this concept existed in an acronym form. It was pleased to know that I've been doing this "in my head," for as long as I have had to deal with the general working public.

Case in point:

Person X comes in to your place of business and wants a lizard. The problem is, you sell spatula's and doorstops. In fact, your store has a huge sign out front that says, "Spatula's and Doorstops - One stop shop."

Person X becomes very disgruntled that you cannot help him and we all know the customer is always right even if he/she is being a right royal pain in the ass.

You smile and nod and continue to explain that you'd be happy to sell him a spatula or a doorstop - and perhaps they would like it if you looked in the Yellow Pages for lizard sellers....

Person X is somewhat pacified and manages a smile and before they go they buy a doorstop. The lizard might want out.

We've all had some kind of irritating situation where we have had to keep many a thought private, "in your head."  Smile and nod and most important - keep cool. 

Often, we fail in the cool department and we feel that we have somehow done something wrong.  We don't fail if we keep it inside and FITYFI. If we stay calm and let that person know we are trying to help - they see it and no matter how annoyed they get, we aren't failing. Even if it feels that way.

FITYFI

I bet I know most of you have been doing FITYFI as well.

Ready?

Fake
It
Til
You
Feel
It

- No, you don't really care that so and so wants something done now and even though they are yelling at you and expecting you do do something NOW - we fake it.  We pretend to understand and care about so and so. If we do this well enough, we can get the feeling out that we actually care. If they feel that, then they walk away thinking something was accomplished.

I learned this and several other "First Aid Kit For Bad Days at Work," ways of coping and maintaining motivation. This was my favorite.

You have no idea how much I have to keep in my head during the day. Thank god for FITYFI!

 

~C