japan

On the way home tonight, I dropped by Pei-Wei to pick up some food for dinner to-go, and I was greeted by the manager with a blank stare and a “Yes?” Not a “Welcome to Pei-Wei. Is this for here or to-go?” Not even a “Hi. What can I get you?” And that was the manager no less.

I, for some reason, began to reflect on how awesome my customer service experiences in Japan were and how customer service in America is nothing like it. Everywhere we went, no matter how prestigious or common the restaurant, we were greeted with an enthusiastic “Irashaimase!!” from the employees.

I had the unfortunate luck of traveling with a very picky eater, so more often than not, we ended up eating at American fast food restaurants in Tokyo and Kyoto. In fact, every morning in Kyoto, we walked down the street to McDonald’s for breakfast. And the script was always the same.

McDonald's in Kyoto

“Welcome! What would you like? Your total is X Yen. You gave me Y Yen, and your change is Z yen. Thank you for coming!” (In Japanese, of course.)

So, how do they do it? How do they inspire such a customer service attitude? Part of it is probably the fact that there are literally hundreds of thousands of other restaurants in a city like Tokyo where customers could be spending their yen, and the franchise owners know this.

And I imagine that the other aspect of it is the Japanese philosophy of “shikata ga nai” (“it can’t be helped”). In other words, while our crappy American fast food workers approach their jobs with the attitude that says, “This job sucks. It’s so below me,” Japanese fast food workers accept the fact that they’re in that position, and they try to do the best job they can.

Of course, I’m a total outsider looking in and drawing my own conclusions. I don’t have a sociology degree. But it makes sense to me.

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