The Good and the Bad...

Saturday, June 21.

Like every job, this one has its pluses and minuses. I enjoy the passengers; the lake itself is an amazing place, the scenery is breath-taking. It doesn't get old.

Yesterday I had a young interpreter from the Park Service. She has ridden with me before, and could hardly look at the passengers while she spoke. I tried to give her some guidance, including some prompting. She would talk about a particular feature before we would get to it and then have nothing to say when we were actually there; passengers would lose interest. I spoke to fill some of those gaps. Apparently, that was a bad thing. I can appreciate the time and effort these kids put into learning the subject matter... when it turns into a wrote recital of facts and dates, I can see the passengers drifting off... they came for a great boat ride, some beautiful scenery, the opportunity to see some wildlife, and a bit of entertainment. Today, I was instructed by my boss to let the interpreters talk and make it on their own. Not as interesting for the passengers, but I got it. Most of the interpreters like a bit of give and take, and they will ask me questions or solicit my take on some features. We have Park Service interpreters three trips per day, and our employees do interpretation the other 4 trips. There is certainly a difference in perspective. The interpretation the passengers enjoy most are the ones that involve the them... ask them questions and invite questions; they know how to unfold a story and relate what the people are seeing to the narration. That obviously takes time and experience.

Later in the day, one of the assistant managers came to my boat to point out I boarded passengers 2-3 minutes early. The passengers are told that their cruise boards at 9:15, but our company decided to change that to 9:20. So, the people are left to stand at the dock for that extra 5 minutes. A minor detail to some, but I feel that we shouldn't leave those folks standing. We still depart at the same time, so it's simply a matter of: do they stand at the dock or come aboard the boat and get settled? I explained to the kindly asst. manager that I was trying to take good care of my passengers. Don't tell the people 9:15, if you don't intend to board them until 9:20. All of our printed material and advertising states 9:15. I understand the new policy, I just don't agree with it.

Nitpicking? Depends on your perspective, I suppose.

And the biggie - the boat is a great boat. We have had almost daily issues with an electronic controller that disables shifting and sometimes steering, on one, and sometimes two, engines. It is intermittent and frustrating. I am told to report it when it happens. I do. Daily. I have had to leave the helm on more than one occasion to go back to the engine compartment to manually shut down the engine and reset. Our mechanics are good, but they don't have an analyzer to read the fault codes on these electronics... so, we "wait and see."

I debated whether to write about this here, but I am trying to make this an accurate log of our experiences. It has been said, "The truth will set you free"... that may be the case here. ;-) Human nature being what it is, most people think they do a good job. I know Joan is friendly and helpful at the front counter; she greets people when they come in and treats them the way we like to be treated. I know I am safety-conscious and care that the passengers get the best we can give them. I have brought the boat to the dock with no steering, and an engine out, and the passengers never knew. I am competent, and I care.

We took these jobs with the idea that it would be a fun summer experience. That said, they are still JOBS. We are in the position that we don't need to work, and when nit-picking and inaction become the norm, we will move on. We like the people we work with and don't want to put anyone out.

So, maybe it was an accumulation of situations that came to a head today? We had a saying in our studio: "No bad days." Don't bring problems to the workplace, quickly and competently solve any problems that come up, and above all - take good care of the client. We still try to live that way, but find our desire to give our customers the best service possible sometimes conflicts with the way this large company operates. We won't compromise our integrity, but will try to work within their guidelines. To a point.

In the meantime, our daughter and son-in-law will be here on Monday and we will have three days off to show them the splendor that is Yellowstone. We are excited.