A consideration of a personal business interaction
I wished for something today that at first surprised me, but made more sense in afterthought. At a grocery store, when it was my turn to checkout, I knew exactly what the cashier would be likely to say, the exact procedure she would follow. After the perfunctory greeting, she would ask whether I had a discount card for the particular store, then scan some or all of the items (depending on their number), then ask which bag type I would like. After all items were scanned and the price totalled, I would brandish my check card, which would prompt the query "Credit or debit?". Of course, I would select debit because I would not want to take the time to get the receipt and sign it when I could simply put in my PIN. In any case, since I selected debit, she would ask whether I could like any cash back, to which I would respond in the negative. After the transaction was completed, she would provide me with a receipt and I would be on my way. Nothing too extraordinary.
But this is what I will do every time, aside from the extremely rare cases of asking for an alternative bag type or for cash back, as a result of special circumstances. In today's case, as I walked out, I found myself thinking, "I sure wish I could set my grocery store config file to those responses as default, and pass special options when necessary." I most likely thought this as a result of being in a programming environment commonly, where seeking such improvements would be a matter of course. I smiled at my thought, but then asked "Wait, why not?" Why need I take my thought away from other considerations to respond whether I would like paper or plastic? Why would that be necessary more than once? Why not have my preferences for such things stored in my debit card, which I would slide through a reader after unpacking my items from the cart?
I think pondering such possibilties is fruitful, in that there is no reason that even small elements of everyday life such as this should not be improved when possible.
But this is what I will do every time, aside from the extremely rare cases of asking for an alternative bag type or for cash back, as a result of special circumstances. In today's case, as I walked out, I found myself thinking, "I sure wish I could set my grocery store config file to those responses as default, and pass special options when necessary." I most likely thought this as a result of being in a programming environment commonly, where seeking such improvements would be a matter of course. I smiled at my thought, but then asked "Wait, why not?" Why need I take my thought away from other considerations to respond whether I would like paper or plastic? Why would that be necessary more than once? Why not have my preferences for such things stored in my debit card, which I would slide through a reader after unpacking my items from the cart?
I think pondering such possibilties is fruitful, in that there is no reason that even small elements of everyday life such as this should not be improved when possible.
4 comments:
And what if you want paper some of the time and plastic other times?
That's why I mentioned passing special options along when desired. I don't know if you have run many things from a command line, DOS or Unix, but when you start a program in that way, you can often pass along certain parameters that alter how it starts. That was the analogy I was working from, that the parameters desired almost every time would be defaulted to, and special cases would be handled individually, which is more efficient.
Or maybe you meant it as a joke:-)
nerd.
-Alec
Oh come now, Mr Kast, I am sure a mathematically-inclined individual such as yourself can appreciate the sentiment. As a function of my daily tasks, I can't perform an activity without considering ways it could be made more efficient.
And really, why would you want to spend time doing the same thing over and over when you didn't have to and it brought you no enjoyment?
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