Yesterday, I took the day off to take my daughter to the eye doctor. I usually go to the “doctor” at the vision centers but this time, I decided to go to a “real” doctor.

His office was about 20 minutes from my house and we got there a little late. (As always, there was so much traffic!)

We sat in the waiting room, filled out the necessary paperwork and read magazines from June of 2009. We waited nearly two hours before we were taken in.

My daughter went first. I followed. The technician looked at our eyes and asked us to read an eye chart. After that, she took us to see the doctor. He started to ask my daughter a series of unrelated questions like, where do you go to school? What are you studying? And he talked about his own daughter doing the same thing.

All I kept thinking, why doesn’t he get to work? Stop shmoozing and start working!

He gave her a quick exam and told her to look at his store where he sold designer glasses at a “discount.”

While I had my exam, she looked at the glasses. She didn’t see anything she liked. So I told the doctor after my exam that we were just going to get our prescriptions and buy the glasses at a vision center.

“Then you owe me $25 bucks,” he said.

“Excuse me?” I said

“Yes, you and your daughter signed the paper that said if you didn’t buy glasses from me, you owe the office $25,” he said.

To not pay the $25, I ended up spending a fortune buying two pair of glasses for my daughter and two pair of glasses for me. When I asked if they could ship them out to me, the woman told me it would be $10 a pair for shipping. (This is unbelievable!!!!)

I was really upset.  I went to a medical doctor who was selling glasses in his office and almost forcing patients to buy his products! He had such a strong sell.  And at first when my daughter couldn’t find anything, he tried to guilt her into buying a pair of glasses.

I don’t know about you, but I really thought that was a conflict of interest.  As we left, I paid my $50 co-pay and when my daughter and I were talking in the hall, the rude receptionist told us to shut the door.  I wouldn’t call that customer service, would you?

Just in case you missed this, here are some examples of sand art recently done in Long Beach, NY.  Amazing what people can do with sand…

My grandmother in-law (my husband’s grandma) died on Friday.  She was in her mid-nineties.  She was an amazing woman.  Up until only about four or five years ago, she was driving.  She was going into the city to go shopping and she was going to Harriman’s with my in-laws.

She was a “big” shoe person.  I think I bought the most expensive shoes I have in my closet when I was with her. She loved “good shoes that lasted.”  I’m sure when someone cleans out her closet, they will find all her shoes still in boxes wrapped up.  Personally, I don’t think she wore all the shoes she bought, but I wasn’t with her all the time to know that.

We became friends after my kids were born.  Before that, I was a little afraid of her. One time, before I was married, I mentioned that the flowers were beautiful at an affair we were at and she went over to the table, picked up the flowers, handed them to me and said, “Take them!” After that, I was a little intimidated.  She was a strong woman who knew what she wanted.

We both loved shoes.  For a couple of years, whenever there was a sale at Robert Clergerie, Ferragamo, or even sometimes Stuart Weitzman, I would pick her up in Queens and we would go on a shoe shopping spree.  Whenever I saw her, we would talk about shoes.  She would also talk about her life in the city, but that’s another story.

Yesterday, I got the urge to buy shoes.  I asked my daughter if she wanted to go to DSW in Westbury and look around.  She said, yes and we drove to Westbury.

As I was strolling along the aisles of DSW (and there are a lot of aisles), I thought about the times that I went shoe shopping with my grandmother-in-law.  It made me smile.  As a tribute to her, I ended up buying a pair of bright blue Bottaga Veneta shoes. Hey, they were on sale!

The other day, I got a call from a friend.  He runs a restaurant in another state and he asked me my advice.

“I have a restaurant full of people who are going behind my back and calling my supervisor to rat me out,” he told me in confidence.

I thought about that all day.  The problem here is team building.  How do you get your team on your side?  Here are some tips:

• Make sure to give your staff a yearly or bi-annual evaluation.  At that time, tell the person your observations and ask for his/her opinion as to how well he/she is doing his/her job.  Also, ask the employee for feedback on your role.  How can you become a better supervisor?

• If a staff member “rats” you out, confront that person.  Ask that person why he/she would do that and not discuss with you first.

• Take your staff members on a retreat out of your place of business.  If you don’t have a day or two to spend with them off site, consider hosting a dinner party at your home.  Try to connect on a personal level.

• When you see your staff after a weekend, ask them how their weekend was.  Make them feel like they are important to you and that you care about them.

• Let them know that you appreciate them.  This is key.  Everyone wants to feel appreciated from time to time and it’s important to let them know that you think they are doing a good job.

• Remember, come in with a smile on your face and give off positive energy.

• Finally, don’t be afraid to give constructive criticism.

You set the tone for your staff.  If you are unhappy, unappreciative and don’t really care about them, they will sense this.  As soon as you make the change, you will see that things will improve.

If you have any other thoughts, please share below.