It was an especially comfortable in Philadelphia this evening, so my wife and I took a moderately long walk to try out a restaurant that was new to us. We’d heard good things about it – and we weren’t disappointed. Not only was the food very good but the service was outstanding. The food came out in a timely manner, and the server was efficient and caring. He seemed to genuinely be concerned about how we were enjoying the food and the experience, and I observed him behaving the same way with those sitting at nearby tables. When he recommended items from the food and drink menus, he assured us that he would substitute something else if we were dissatisfied with the recommendations. We enjoyed everything, and no substitutes were needed.
On the way back home we stopped at our favorite gelato shop. It’s one of those places with lots of creative flavors – and you can try as many as you want before ordering, which makes it an especially nice experience when our grandchildren come to visit. After we made our selections and were sitting at a table and enjoying them, the store manager stopped by and pleasantly asked about our choices and how we were enjoying them, and then he gave us some suggestions to try next time. By the time we parted company, we felt like old friends even though we had never met before.
I’m not naive. I know that being nice to people is good for business. But I also know that there are levels of niceness. We would have enjoyed an absolutely pleasant evening even if the restaurant server and gelato shop manager didn’t go out of their way to make the experience more special – just so long as they weren’t boorish in their behaviors. I also recognize that pleasant people don’t make up for lousy food. But I also know that the niceness of the people who served us added significantly to the enjoyment of the evening.
These days when we are bombarded with examples negative attitudes and interactions in news reports about the highest level of government and business and other aspects of our lives, we really owe it to ourselves to notice niceness when it occurs. Learning theory teaches us that behaviors that are rewarded then to be repeated to the point of habituation. If we begin to pay more attention to those whose nice qualities and behaviors make us feel better, and we begin to let them and their supervisors know if our appreciation, and if we even spread the word through social media, and especially if we go back and patronize settings that hire and train people who are nice, perhaps we can play a leadership role in making the world a nicer place.