How Far Thank You Can Reach

From the moment I was a small child ( yes I haven't always been massively tall) my mom always told me and my sibling how important it is to write a thank you note. After every Christmas and birthday we were required to write thank you notes. I always viewed this as a tiresome and tedious task while the mother bird sat and watched me write the note. Though at the time I thought she was just hassling me for no reason looking back I truly realize the value of writing thank you notes.

My freshman year of college I realized what career interest I wanted to go into and decided to try to start pursuing setting myself up for gather more information about it. The industry of theme parks that I have chosen to work in is the perfect industry for me to work in. I am a very high energy personality that can't sit still and I couldn't imagine sitting in a cubicle all day. (I think the viewing of fight club scared that out of me). Being able to freely walk around all day and be surround by people seemed perfect to me.

So late into my freshman year I started to express this interest to my bosses. The first person I talked to was my unit supervisor. She had no idea I had such an interest and had prepared to show me all of the things I could do. She actually set up a meeting with the GM of the area and he also was very enthusiastic of my interest.

After both of these meetings I went to talk to one of my professors about this experience and he suggested to write a handwriting thank you note. Now this seemed very odd to me but I mentioned it to the mother bird and she seemed to fully agree how great that would be.

As a side note you must realized how bad my handwriting is. I absolutely hate it but I like to think it is because in second grade I was put in the special handwriting group due to my bad penmanship so I have kept bad handwriting to spite that experience.

Anyway, I started drafting two handwritten thank you notes and distributed them accordingly. I heard the next day from my unit supervisor about the thank you note. She expressed how much she liked my note. As far as my GM I didn't hear anything for weeks. I figured that he either didn't receive the note or didn't care enough to come and comment on it. The note drifted out of my mind and I almost totally forgot about it.

About roughly a month later I was working in a store and my GM came in and said to the green tyro who was rattling around 'I received your note and I just wanted to let you know how nice that was. ' Now as insignificant this moment may now be I will never forget the feeling and the words he said. It was definitely a turning point for the tyro and a good lesson in networking for dummies.

Most recently a thank you moment happened with one of my professors at school. This past week was the last week of lectures for my Guest Service class. My professor though a little scattered brained definitely made an impact on not only my school work but also my work life. I decided to go up to thank him because I actually had tangible results.

Prior to taking the class over the summer my boss had told me I needed to work on my dealings with difficult guest situations. This had always been in the back of my mind and I really wanted to somehow improve on this. When the fall semester finally kicked off each week I took what I learned in class and tried to apply it each week to work. I also went up to my boss and requested that if there is a negative situation to send me out first.

Applying this knowledge from class to work definitely sent me in the right direction so at the end of his lectures I decided to go up to my professor and thank him. I did a few double takes until I finally got up to him. I quickly rushed out this paragraph:

'I just wanted to thank you for this semester. At work I was told that I need to work on my guest service and so I have been trying to apply things that I learn here at work. I have been doing it and I got recognition from my bosses. So I really appreciate what you do and I wanted you to know it made an impact."

Following this I jumped down and walked away. As I was saying this I could see his eyes brightening and I realized that I in turn made an impact on him and it made me feel extremely happy.

Though it was extremely difficult for me to put myself out there like that it was completely worth it because not only did it help me but it also benefited him.

Thank you is such a simple thing but it is not said enough. I am trying to get better about it but I know I still miss it often. Saying thank you can definitely be one of the things that makes an incredible lasting impression.