Restaurant Server Asks Her Manager For Help During A Rush, But Instead Of Helping, The Manager Stops Her To Teach Her How To Make Chocolate Milk
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There’s nothing more frustrating than asking for help and getting a lesson you never asked for instead.
One restaurant server dealt with that while opening a busy shift with only one other employee.
Within minutes, they were slammed with a soccer group of more than 20 people while still handling full sections.
So, the server asked her manager to run two waters while she finished making drinks for the large table.
Instead of helping, the manager stopped her and insisted on teaching her a lesson.
Read on to see how it all played out.
That time my manager refused to help me and instead “taught” me how to make chocolate milk
This was maybe 6 months ago or more. On this day, I opened our busy restaurant with 1 other server.
We immediately got a soccer league of maybe 22-25, mostly kids, and the other server and I split them while also getting slammed with a full section each. 3 other servers weren’t going to arrive for another 45 minutes.
I was making who knows how many Shirley Temples and chocolate milks, and I asked my manager, “Hey, I’m really in the weeds. Would you mind running two waters to 34 while I handle the big top drinks?”
Unfortunately, her manager thought something else was more important at that moment.
She responds, “Oh, I’ll ask [other server who is equally busy] if she can run them for you. But, in the meantime, can I show you a better way to do that?”
Me: “What? Make chocolate milk?”
I had a sturdy drink glass that I was using to vigorously stir the sauce into the milk, then pouring it into each kid’s cup, reusing the glass each time.
If I had the time, I would also decorate the inside walls of the kid’s cup with a wave of syrup to look nice, but now I was doing it this way to avoid stirring in the flimsy cup and having it look ugly with stirred-syrup streaks on the sides.
Frustrated, she stopped to listen.
She said, “Yeah, I have a trick that is so much easier. I want to show you.”
So, I replied, “Um… I’m good, thanks. Just need to get these out. Thought I’d ask for help with something easier while you had the time.”
She didn’t listen at all, “No, here, let me show you. It’ll only take a second.”
So I completely stop what I’m doing, holding my full tray of drinks to the 20+ top who were already clamoring to order their apps.
Apparently, the secret is to add boiling water.
My manager grabbed a kid’s cup, squeezed the chocolate syrup in, then filled the cup almost 1/3 with boiling water from the espresso machine. She then stirred and filled the rest of the cup with milk.
“See, this is so much easier. You don’t have to stir as much.”
“….Okay,” I said. “Thanks for the help, I guess.”
Yikes. There’s no way that’s going to save a considerable amount of time compared to what she was already doing.
Let’s see how the readers over at Reddit feel about the manager’s lesson.
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Yes, making it ahead would’ve been better.
Here’s another reader who thinks they should’ve had chocolate milk already made up.
That would be frustrating.
If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a woman who received a work email from a place she never even applied.
The manager’s way doesn’t sound good at all.
What a waste of time.
She wasn’t trying to ask the manager how to make chocolate milk. She was asking for help with customers because the restaurant was slammed.
The manager actually slowed progress instead of helping.
If that’s how she handles a busy restaurant, someone probably needs to reevaluate whether she should be managing anyone at all.
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