The Spoon
Last week, we took some friends to a new restaurant, ' Steve's Place, ' and noticed that the waiter who took our order carried a spoon in his shirt pocket.
It seemed a little strange. When the busboy brought our water and utensils, I observed that he also had a spoon in his shirt pocket.
Then I looked around and saw that all the staff had spoons in their pockets. When the waiter came back to serve our soup I inquired, ' Why the spoon ? '
' Well, ' he explained, ' the restaurant's owner hired Andersen Consulting to revamp all of our processes. After several months of analysis, they concluded that the spoon was the most frequently dropped utensil. It represents a drop frequency of approximately 3 spoons per table per hour.
If our personnel are better prepared, we can reduce the number of trips back to the kitchen and save 15 man - hours per shift. '
As luck would have it, I dropped my spoon and he replaced it with his spare. ' I'll get another spoon next time I go to the kitchen instead of making an extra trip to get it right now . . . ' I was impressed.
I also noticed that there was a string hanging out of the waiter's fly.
Looking around, I saw that all of the waiters had the same string hanging from their flies. So, before he walked off, I asked the waiter, ' Excuse me, but can you tell me why you have that string right there ? '
' Oh, certainly ! ' Then he lowered his voice. ' Not everyone is so observant. That consulting firm I mentioned also learned that we can save time in the restroom.
By tying this string to the tip of our you - know - what, we can pull it out without touching it and eliminate the need to wash our hands, shortening the time spent in the restroom by 76.39%. '
I asked quietly, ' After you get it out, how do you put it back ? '
' Well, ' he whispered, ' I don't know about the others, but I use the spoon.'