Public Issues

The evening staff from Wednesday night had an unpleasant encounter with a patron--took three of them to deal with her. They wrote up an account of it all: seems that among other things this lady wants a piece of me. She mentioned she won't come in when she sees my car parked out front. There had been overdues, there had been charges she didn't feel were accurate. She feels we're conspiring against her, yada yada.

Actually, there have been charges that I have waived in the past just to placate her.

Everyone who deals with the public has irrational customer stories. You have to learn to project the right combination of obsequiousness and authority and it can be a difficult balance to achieve. I've had a couple encounters with her and felt distinctly that they hadn't gone well.

It grieves me--I'm not a confrontational type. We're a tiny public library and just can't afford any ill will in the community. So I plan to call her and make nice, to see if we can get onto a better footing together.

Adventures in diplomacy...