Originally Posted By goofy4041 as most have said we do thatnk all the great CM who go out of there way to help. we all agree that there are people who can not be pleased but on the other hand there are CM although few and far between but they are there and have made some unhappy. And yes you should report it and yes i for one have many times said how much my family thanks them for there help and smile. We are not hear to bash CM. imho
Originally Posted By goofy4041 Sorry if i sound upset but for some one to tell me or any one what they have been through, that gets to me.. I think it is great you have had no problems but that does not mean others have had the same. As i have said before we all look and act different to a situation. And to tell all CM to disregard what is said here is wrong,thats what i get out of your post IMO i think its great for people to hear there is a problem and see if they can do some thing to help make it better. I think it was in this topic that someone said they have seen leads that have a bad attitude and passed it on to the ones they teaching. It is something worthtalking about and tring to understand.
Originally Posted By Actress56 <<Actress56, you are absolutely correct in that you CM's are human, and subject to the same ups and downs that the rest of us have. But the whole concept of "on stage" comes into play. You're not at a regular job - you're a CAST MEMBER in a Disney park. The expectations are higher, both from your employer and from your customers. It's the same mentality that professional musicians and actors have to live with. It doesn't matter how bad you feel, or what happened to you the night before. When the curtain goes up, people are expecting your greatest effort>> I will say it again. Study human nature and personality. To expect someone to completely check their emotions and personality at the door just because they are at work is an impossible request. I am not making excuses for those rude cast members, cause I have seen them. But you cannot tell me that you are perfect and can deflect all the outside protagonists (sp?) of life. No one can do that. No person on this planet cannot make their day to day actions non-personal. Your personality decides how you handle every situation adn every decision you make. Just because my job is at the Disneyland Resort does not mean that I can perfectly put on a facade while at work. Even actors and professional musicians bring their personal lives and experiences into their performances on stage. A moment for one actor can be completely different for another actor because what has happened in their life. A line in a play that the same actor has been performing for months can change in a night because of something that happened to them earlier that day. A professional musician can even bring out different emotions in how they play an instrument. Again, if you have a bad experience, posting it here really wont change much. Yelling till you are blue in the face about a cast member being "on stage" wont help anything. Go to city hall. That is where your biggest changes will be made.
Originally Posted By Tiggirl I don't think anyone suggested you be a robot. We've only jus suggested that there are CM's who are rude to guests. There are CM's who take pleasure in yelling at guests. There are CM's who should not be on stage and who have no idea how to handle guests. And then we discussed why that might be. We discussed if it was society in general, if it was the fault of how low Disney pays, if it was the fault of the guests or if the fault lay on the shoulders of the Cast Members alone. You yourself admitted to konwing CM's that can be rude... why is that? Its a discussion. No one said you personally were a bad or rude CM. If you're confident that you treat every guest with courtesy and that you keep up the show for them then you have nothing to worry about. ~Beth
Originally Posted By Disney Joy I think all of us reading these posts can take something good from them. Whether a CM or a Guest - think about what we do - say and how we treat each other. yes CM's are human and can have a bad day or be going thru something - but that sure be a rare thing and if it's to bad - maybe that CM should take the day off. Just a thought... or speak to their manager and work a different behind the scene area (not sure if that is an option) I personally have had way way more excellent - good experiences than the one I can remember. AND I know personally as I have posted before - I need to go make some good comments to CH about some of my outstanding experiences. I also feel for those who have had bad - rude - experiences because like it or not - Disney is suppose to be the Happiest Place on Earth.
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Originally Posted By Westsider I like to go to Six Flags Magic Mountain. Just seeing how truly horrible the employees are, and on such a wide scale all over their park, makes me so happy at where I get to work, and makes me feel so good about myself. Has anyone here been to Six Flags Magic Mountain? Have you ever tried to overlay the Disneyland expectations on to the output and performance you get from the Six Flags employees? It's a really fun game.
Originally Posted By RAM1984 Hi TMICHAEL, After having critisized me so vehemently it seems the least you could do is reply to my story (now topic #845 in community)with a now informed answer. Do you still feel that I may be one of those APers that, "think they know everything and are entitled to what ever they want."? I hope not. I love Disneyland, I have the highest regrard for CM's, I know many who feel honored to work at DL to spite the low wages. I am sorry it is, "just that, A JOB" for you. There is an entire tread still on the first page about "Great Cast Members." It is full of testimonials about wonderful experiences. I have posted there too. I have had many bad days in my life. The day I had to send my son off to Iraq I then had to face a classful of rowdy 9th graders. Had I lashed out at a student I would have been called on the carpet immediately. Bad day or no, I had to put on my professional personna. I cried when I got home.
Originally Posted By danyoung Actress56, I hope you didn't think I was unfeeling in what I wrote (after reading it again it seemed like I was coming on strong - how unlike me!). And again, I agree with what you said about a person's personal life affecting their work life. Then you said - >Even actors and professional musicians bring their personal lives and experiences into their performances on stage.< That is absolutely true. But there is a minimum level below which a professional will not go. There are stories all over about how a stage actor lost his dad that morning and then went on to give the performance of his life. It's not the audience's fault that he had a tragedy, and he was professional enough to do his best to keep the 2 separate. Heck, I've gone on stage before with a 102 temp and a trash bucket behind my amp in case I ralphed. But I still went on and kicked butt, and only my friends and co-workers knew how sick I was. It's all about how much you respect the people that you're performing for (and a good CM is indeed performing - "on stage", remember?). >To those of you spouting off that we are "on stage" like actors and musicians I say B freakin S. The wages CM's make are no where near equity or union scale so thats a load of Pooh.< And we wonder why there's a problem with CM's today? I know, that's a snarky comment, but that's what your comments brought out of me. It has absolutely NOTHING to do with pay - it has everything to do with your attitude in your job. Are you selling popcorn or running a ride or hocking merchandise, or are you a performer in a show? The desired attitude for Disney CM's should always be the latter, but they don't seem to be doing a good job teaching it these days. I've met many CM's over the years who "get it", who can't imagine even the concept of being rude to a guest, no matter how obnoxious he or she was. Then there are many more who don't "get it", who talk on cell phones while snapping their gum as they ignore the guests that are paying their wages. And my whole point is that there seems to be more of these lately.
Originally Posted By Actress56 Pay does have something to do with it though. That has already been discussed on this thread. It is a common business practice, if you have someone great, you will pay whatever it takes to keep them. If you want new hires to be great, you need to pay enough to get those great people just to apply. Yes, a big group of cast members are there because it is Disneyland, but the company cannot expect to get great people applying if that same great person can go somewhere else and make better pay.
Originally Posted By AJTW I want to know as a guest how to show appreciation to the CMs that are having a bad day to perk them up. Especially the ones with the attitude or eye rolls. Just a token of have a great day since they don't appreciate a smile or a thank you. What nice thing can we do at that moment of interaction that can go beyond the verbal or visual without being invasive. Any ideas?
Originally Posted By Disney Joy yeah a clunk on the head ! Na just kidding ~ Relly Just Kidding ~ ROFL
Originally Posted By JazzCat True story~happened today: 99% of the time I am polite and friendly to customers. Today I was brought into the back and shown a highly inferior mystery shopper survey that was done on me. My boss gave me a "look" when I told her that was one of the days I was really sick. So it makes me wonder~does Disneyland has mystery shoppers?
Originally Posted By Westsider I've been on lots of Mystery Shops. Never a bad one though, knock on wood. Sometimes I'm just noted as "CM #3" or something, and they don't say much about me. Sometimes they'll write a small paragraph about what I did. They've had Mystery Shoppers for years and years now.
Originally Posted By Actress56 I have had an entire mystery guest score written about me. Yes, sometimes you are just "CM #2 greeted me with a smile", but i had a 100% score all about me and what i did. i even remembered the guest even though it was like a month later. and there is no greater feeling than knowing someone aprreciated what i do.
Originally Posted By danyoung > If you want new hires to be great, you need to pay enough to get those great people just to apply.< Actress56, once again I agree with your entire post, forcing me to redefine what I'm trying to say. Yes, if you pay more money, you're naturally going to attract better people (or at least more people, allowing you to pick and choose). And I totally agree that Disney CM's are grossly underpaid. But what I object to is someone taking a job at Disney, knowing what's expected of them and knowing what they're going to get paid, and then saying "I ain't making much money, so I have the right to be grumpy to the guests". When you take the job, you also take certain expectations that go along with it. Many CM's these days aren't meeting those expectations, and management doesn't seem to be doing much about it. Start paying $10/hour to start and the whole picture changes instantly . . .
Originally Posted By pecos bill Considering the low pay, and the decline of common courtesy in society in general, perhaps it is a minor miracle that we get the level of service at Disneyland that we do. But that, in no way, detracts from our right to say that we have noticed a difference through the years. Anyone who cannot see this is either a poor observer of human nature, or must view the world through rose colored glasses.
Originally Posted By monorailblue Mystery Guests were a prickly subject when I trained on Monorail in 1999. We were going for the longest continuous string of 100% scores at the time, or something like that, and when we got a 97% or something, we had 3 assistant managers and our manager involved in trying to get it corrected! It had something to do with the placement of guidebooks, I think. On a brigher note, I was named in a 100% score on my first day of Monorail training! I thought I figured out who mystery guests were a couple of times on Autopia, but I was wrong. On Attractions with height limits, they will almost always have a child just under the height limit, and they will always ask a question of at least one CM to see how they respond. They also look for maintenance issues. We only got excused from being dinged on a broken light in the Autopia queue (about 4 times), by having work orders placed (again and again and again and again) showing that Attractions did everything we could.
Originally Posted By Actress56 There definitly has been a difference through out the years. I think this thread has come to that decision already. However, you have to look at the reasons why. I know that the excuse "I dont make enough money so i dont care" doesnt fly. But there are a whole bunch of reasons why the decline of service has happened.
