“Don’t try to be different. Just be good. To be good is different enough.”
—Arthur Freed
I suspect my wife is beginning to hate going out to eat with me.
The thing is, it’s hard to find a restaurant that does a really, really good job. Lots of restaurants do an “okay” job, and we’re happy to eat there most of the time. Some restaurants are just terrible.
Now let me define terrible: bad food and/or bad service. You see, they really only have to get two things right, don’t they?
Before we get too far (and I do have a larger point that has nothing to do with restaurants and everything to do with you… and I’ll get to it in a moment…), I must mention that there is a place for grace and mercy in this conversation.
Anyone and everyone can have a bad day. Having a bad day is not terrible, it’s having a bad day. The difference between the two is the attitude behind it. The response to having a bad day is the admission, “hey, I’m sorry we messed up. Please let me fix that.” Being terrible is usually accompanied by an atmosphere of apathy or, in some cases, thinly veiled hostility.
I’m pretty understanding about a bad day (I’ve had many of my own), but I’ve gotten to the point that I call out bad food and bad service. One of the reasons I do that is because I feel like I have a moral obligation to do so; leaving such behavior unmentioned makes it easier for them to perpetrate it against the next unfortunate customer. But it won’t be me — we won’t be back. There are plenty of good restaurants in our area, and I want to make sure they thrive and crush the bad restaurants. The bad restaurants should be driven out of business.
My point is: you and I live in a word that is all too accepting of mediocrity. As an Authority, this is actually to your advantage. Just do your thing well. And as you’re doing your thing, do the “show” that surrounds it very well. And that’s all you need.
This is good news — don’t worry about being original or unique. Just be good. That’s enough.