Words of encouragement

--by silentdreamer, posted Jan 7, 2007

Today I walked into a shop and was served by a young boy - he must have been around 18.

He was being told off by his boss for something. Even if what his boss was saying was valid, which I do not know, because I do not know the full story, I still felt that the way he was being treated was unfair.

He was being put down in front of customers and all the other staff. The boss told him that he should not serve in the front of the shop anymore, where he deals with customers and should serve at the back. Then although the boy had started serving me, his boss asked him to stop and passed on the job to somebody else.

The boy did not say anything but I could see that he was really upset. I could also see that he could easily have done what I had asked him to do for me, just by the way he explained the job to the next person whom it was passed on to.

I came away feeling that the boy was being treated unfairly and was being discouraged rather than encouraged to learn, even if he had made some mistakes, which I did not know about.

I picked up his name in the ongoing conversation and I had the address of the shop from the receipt I got.

I decided to send him a thank you card from an anonymous customer, with a short note to thank him for his help.

I hope that it brings a smile to his face and gives him some encouragement while he is learning and possibly making some mistakes along the way.

5222 Reads

Posted by silentdreamer
Jan 7, 2007
Comments (16)

Readers Comments

Thaata wrote: Belittling someone in front of others is very bad. Praise publicly but admonish privately. You have done a great job to bolster is sagging morale. With such appreciations, he will turn out to be good.

heavensto wrote: Positive reinforcement is so badly needed when learning new skills. Thank you for giving some to this young man.

David wrote: Congratulations for your gesture, it shows a good command also of emotional intelligence skills : empathy,. Regards from mallorca(spain).

madhur wrote: So nice to know what you did, something simple, easy yet so thoughtful. We all could do similar things daily.

Derek Sahfe wrote: i think you did well by sending him that.It will go a long way to encourage and help him coupe with situations like that.Thank you for that.

venkatt wrote: wow that was good of you

Ginny wrote: What nice and kind thing too. You want out of you way to make someone elese feel better. Thank for doing that.

kienje wrote: Wow that is very kind of you i know the boy felt good.Thank you for making him smile!!

iei wrote: it is a lesson learned for all of us... let us be all more considerate to people... :P

chimezie wrote: wow that is good of you because bible say you must receive the blessing of every goodthing you do to your fellow human being keep it up you make him smile and god will bless you

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