It’s worth blogging about because, well, it seems so rare.
Two examples of competence that by coincidence happened on the same day this past week:
One, an all-day Microsoft conference at the new Boston Expo Center on Summer Street. The theme of the conference was the launch of MSFT’s new releases of Visual Studio and SQL Server. The presentations were excellent, and MSFT had arranged for 1:1’s with SMEs on the new technology.
As always, they provided a box lunch and refreshments throughout the day, and most importantly, licenses for the Standard Editions of both pieces of software.
All in all, a job extremely well done.
The second was the conversion of an electric to gas stove at #11, something I’ve been wanting to do since we bought the house.
Peter is the chief cook, and he has never been especially happy working with the old electric stove that came with the house. If you’ve ever cooked with gas, you know why. Besides, one of the burners was out, and the oven light never worked.
We tried to give the job to one of our neighbors, a plumber who rumor has it wants to start his own business.
Unfortunately, his communication skills leave a lot to be desired. He kept blowing us off, and I was getting nervous about it because the newish gas stove which another, extremely generous neighbor gave us after she updated her kitchen had been sitting under a tarp on the back porch for a couple of weeks.
Fortunately, we knew of another company who’d done some excellent work on the house earlier this year, a particularly nasty job involving the outflow pipe to the septic system.
This particular company never fails to amaze: they were at the house within 24 hours. They were courteous, professional and even thanked us for giving them a small job which fit neatly into their schedule.
Maybe it’s because I’ve been dealing with so many non-profit organizations lately, not to mention some egregiously inconsiderate people in the private sector, the phenomenon of excellent service stood out in greater contrast than usual.
As did the small and large kindnesses of friends.