a reply to:
TinySickTears
That's the one man...no such thing as a 'Joe Job', and this one sounds pretty sweet as well.
Bottom-line is there's always money to be made for the working...so work it hard and get paid hard.
...i try to make small talk with each house i go to....i see a nice car in the driveway and i make a comment on it...things like that.
And this - sooooo much this.
Blue Collars to Business Owners to those on benefits...all of them eat pizza...so you never know who you'll be meeting and sharing 'small talk
with'.
All business is relationships - keeping good relationships is not only good for business but also good for potential future mileage-banking and new
business should you ever come across them again somewhere.
First full-time well paid job I got was when I was working weekends and the odd weekday evening/night shift at McDs while studying at University. Was
always friendly, greeting everyone, attentive to details, always smiling (smiles are free), remembering the regulars and what they ordered...making
that small-talk and being present and listening to them so you could fully engage and remember what they said...
Had one of the regulars, Mike, who I'd see every other Saturday night coming in late for his usual Big Mac Combo (hold the pickle and onions) with
unsalted fries and a Large chocolate shake...he approached the counter one night and said
"Hey. Do you drive?"
"Yes sir I do. Interesting question there sir"
"Do you have a full licence?"
"Yes sir"
"Any criminal convictions?"
"Umm. No sir"
"Excellent. Want a full-time job?"
"Well - I'm studying at university at the moment sir, so unfortunately only able to work part-time until December"
"Cool. Here's my card. Give me a buzz on Monday and we'll talk more"
...ended up being a private corporate chauffeur part-time until December, then fulltime over the break, then back to part-time when I returned to
university...got paid minimum twice as much as I was at McDs, often 3 times as much...and on occasion depending on who I was transporting would
receive tips more than I'd made that whole week! Remember once driving a [un-named foreign business person] around for the morning to see the sights,
telling them all the history and such of various places, showing them around other places they were interested in...and they ended up tipping me $5k
cash...like whoa...
Mike was just impressed that no matter how demanding people were, or drunk, abusive, disorganised, arrogant, condescending, a-holish people were I was
always polite and friendly, always smiled and thanked them, and made a point of remembering even the smallest of details about people and their lives
(if they shared them)
This business person also returned to NZ/New Zealand for a holiday the following year, and was planning on spending a week travelling around the North
Island. So they got a hold of me via Mike, asked if I'd like to be their driver/tour guide for the week. All expenses paid. Stayed with them in some
of the most high-end Hotels and Resorts...and they paid me $10k for that week.
Showed them how to trout fish in Taupo/Turangi (where I grew up), showed them how to gather pipi/native clam out in the tides with his trousers pulled
up to his knees in Tauranga (where my Iwi/tribe comes from), stopped in at whanau/family and had a hangi/our traditional ground-cooked meal, taught
him how to do a Haka/our traditional 'war-dance of sorts' (Ka mate ka mate - the one our All Blacks rugby team does)...he had a great time...
He tried to slip me a $5k tip when I dropped them back off but I refused that...had quite the discussion/debate we did around my refusal of the
tip...but figured they'd paid me so generously already and I'd had such a great time I was pretty much willing to forego even getting paid at all.
That led to similar repeat business from other people he knew who were holidaying in our country.
Many of the people I have working for me now - and many of those I've had working for me in the past - started working for me after similar 'Mike'
conversations...noting that person had great people-skills...
Go for it.
Great things come from great effort.
edit on 9-12-2016 by alien because: (no reason given)