Whether or not you divulge your AS is probably irrelavant.
I'm a cashier in a large supermarket. Our 1st responsiblity is to be helpful to the customers. According to my managers, there is no excuse for rudness. Even when it's the customer who's rude; our response is to "simply apologise profusely to the customer" even though the customer's demands may be unreasonable. I know it sounds unfair, BUT, it actually is very simple and if you frame it correctly, it's painless.
I mentally frame it this way; I like my job and my wages. The vast majority of the customers are nice and reasonable. There are some jerks in the world and sometimes one of them is being jerky to me at my job. Having to say, "Sorry, my mistake." once every few days or weeks is no big deal. And the jerky customer is gone in minutes and I may never see him/her again.
My supervisors are mostly pretty curt with us, but that's because they're slammin busy and are transmitting their orders to us in verbal shorthand. In actuallity they are very patient with our mistakes and point us in the right direction without repercussions. Even though at times I feel let down by them when they're short with me about directions; overall I'm grateful that they're so patient about mistakes. So in this environment, I learn by doing, and not so much by verbal instruction. It works.
BUT, mistakes in the area of politeness to customers are considered grave mistakes. I have seen more than a few workers here fired for rudeness to customers.
I'm pretty sure that at least a couple of my co-workers are aspies. The rules and systems at my job apply to everyone the same.
Here's an example, one of the new baggers appears to have severe short term memory problems. We all discovered this about her by working with her (she didn't divulge it). She breaks a lot of rules because she can't remember the rules. The managers and supervisors make allowances for her deficits. But she's good with the customers. If she were rude she'd be fired.
Quote:
This also happens with most customers who abruptly start asking me a question. (which is several times a day)
Please do whatever you can to respond reasonably to customer's abruptness. That's just how it is, abrupt. They have a question, they approach the 1st store employee they see and ask straightaway. Think about it, how would it be any other way? It's your job to listen to their questions and point them in the right direction or get an answer for them. If this is an impossibility for you, then in effect you cannot do your job and aspie or not, if you can't perform the routine taskes of the job you will lose the job.
21 Sep 2011, 8:41 pm
