Team Cohesion, key to success?

I just came back from my favorite fast food restaurant, Taco Bell, and noticed a signifcant jump in overall quality in the restaurant. The food was good, as well as the service, I was impressed.

I began to think of many other fast food experiences that I have endured recently, and all but this one were lackluster at best. Most recently was last night. Me and Andrew ventured to KMart to pick up some bitchin' sleds for some deathsledding that would take place earlier, but afterwards we went to go buy some food at McDonalds. I had high hopes walking into the restaurant because the cashier looked intelligent, at least intelligent enough to competently work the cash register, or deal with any problems that could occur while operating it. Alas, he was not. I wanted 1 10-piece chicken nugget, instead after a full minute of searching for the right key, I got charged for a 10-piece chicken nugget and a XL Raspberry Iced Tea. 1-minute doesn't sound like a long time, but if you think about standing at a register for a full minute, you realize how much time it really is. If each customer took 1 minute, the lunch rush they typically receive would not get reconciled for over 2 hours. So after the first minute, and after I explained to him that he made a mistake he spent another minute trying to figure out how to undo it. I had tolerance and was curious to see how he would handle it. What he should have done is asked one of the 3 people within 5 feet of him how to fix it, so for one he would know for next time, and two, he wouldn't hold me up further. Yet he just tried to fix it himself, wasting another full minute. Finally he asked the guy next to him, who fixed it in less than 5 seconds. Now we were back to square one. I just told him to give me 1 20-piece instead, since Andrew was going to get the same thing. To make an unneccesarily long story shorter he eventually got it up to 3 10-piece chicken nuggets, then finally back down to 2 10-pieces which was charged for a 20. He then proceeded to give me 1 10-piece chicken nugget on a tray, when I had specifically answered his question earlier that I wanted my order to go. We stared at each other for a good 15 seconds until he told me I was all set. I told him he gave me only 10 when I ordered a 20. He took the 10 back and went to go look for a 20, which clearly was not there. I just told him to give me two 10-pieces, and we were on our way.

A miserable, yet slightly hilarious experience. I'd like to say this is an isolated incident, but alas, it is not. Though not to this severity, this is a typical occurence. Most often fast food teams are a loosely-knit, multi-langual, multi-cultural grab bag of suck. This isn't saying that different ethnicities can't work hard or well though. The key to 'team cohesion' is fun. At Sandwich Construction (where I work) we break up the monotony of making sammiches and cleaning up the store at the end of the day, with intermittent breaks, often only 30 seconds, that yield a laugh from the majority of the staff. Whether it be a well-planned ambush on a fellow employee driving in, drag racing the es-tangs (ford escort station wagons) or just throwing tomatoes at the cure for childrens cancer clothing dumpster, it has a positive effect. I'm sure some study somewhere says that laughter increases a workers productivity 'x' amount, but I'm saying from personal experience that when I'm having a good time, I work harder, as long as it doesn't get out of hand.

Now at Taco Bell today, they had a competent cashier, who spoke English well, knew what he was doing, and was quick and efficent. I heard the staff laughing a bit and seemingly having a good time. The lady who yelled out the orders was loud and clear. And unlike many times before at this particular location, my crunchy tacos were sufficently filled, and delicious.

Though often one non-conformist of them team can bring down the whole thing. i.e. a girl 'Nena' that I worked with on Fridays and Saturdays over the course of about 3-weeks. She was a complete waste of space, had no intention of improving her work ethic, and was just bad all around. It took her an hour and fifteen minutes to do a 20 minute job, then she would waste time and just walk around the store straightening out napkins and the like. Seeing this annoys everyone and slows them down. Eventually she was.... disposed of, and the morale of the team greatly improved from a disgrunteled worker level to one where optimal work efficeny was reobtained and happiness was palpable.

In conclusion, having a few people that can work hard, is a lot different than having a team that does work hard.