700 Candy Canes: A “Nice Bike” Christmas Story

Posted on December 24, 2011 by admin

You never know when you might create an important connection with someone that could change your life or theirs. And sometimes, you might be making a connection and not even realize it.

My parents were named Norbert and Agnes, but everyone called them Nubs and Aggie. Not exactly the nicknames a kid would pick out for his parents, but they were the best parents a kid could ever be lucky enough to have.

Nubs was born in St. Cloud, Minnesota, and his grandparents were from Germany. Aggie was born in Minnesota, too, and her parents were both Irish. Now, that’s quite a mix: German structure blended with the carefree heart of the Irish. Good stuff, you betcha.

Dad worked at the St. Cloud post office where he sorted mail for a living. He was a good guy—just not the most flexible person you’d ever meet. He was a classic old-school dad:

“We eat at 5:30 p.m. sharp. If you are not at the table, you won’t be eating with us tonight.”

“We buy Ford. What the heck were you thinking when you bought that Fiat?”

“We eat fish on Friday. I don’t care if the Pope says it’s now okay to eat meat on Friday. I am not going to go to hell because that guy changed the rules.”

“That’s my chair. If I am not in the house, you can go ahead and give it a test drive, but if I walk in the back door, you get the heck out of my chair.”

One thing was for sure—you knew where my dad stood on all issues.

My mom? Well, she’s a saint, and if there’s a hard way to do something, she’ll find it. At eighty-seven years of age, she still does the laundry in the basement with a Maytag wringer washer. You can only find them in antique stores today. She then takes the laundry, hauls it in a basket up the basement steps and outside to hang on the clotheslines. Mom does this every Monday, every month of the year, including January. Continue reading →

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Homemade Italian: Honoring Nonna’s Cooking

Posted on May 11, 2011 by Mark Scharenbroich

Our daughter Kate graduated from the Natural Gourmet Institute in Manhattan this spring.  During her stay in New York City she was on a quest to find small, unique restaurants.  She found just the place in Staten Island, one that serves up homemade Italian meals.

Taking “Homemade Italian” Literally

The 35-seat Enoteca Maria restaurant brings in grandmothers to cook for customers: nonnas from Napoli, Sicily, Abruzzo, Venice, Milan, and Campania.

What’s for dinner? Depends on who’s in the kitchen and which ingredients are in the refrigerator. Every day, one of the eight grandmothers employed by owner Joe Scaravella arrives at about 3 p.m. and gets cooking.

Continue reading →

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Staying Connected with Older Parents in a Nursing Home

Posted on April 8, 2011 by Mark Scharenbroich

This came from a Minneapolis reader who sent a kind note. I was moved by how she was able to connect with her father-in-law by using one of the core principles in my book. Nice Bike, Jane! — M.S.

Mark,

Connecting with a parent in a nursing homeI just finished reading Nice Bike and really enjoyed it. It heightened my awareness of the importance of complimenting people and affirming them whenever you can. Your message of conversing with people at their level —engaging people in conversation in what interests them —is something I really needed to hear. That message was so timely as I visited my husband’s dad in a care center over the last two years.  At first, I brought books that interested me and games that I thought he would enjoy.  However, they were not interesting to him.

In time, I learned how to jump in his world and just sit with him and talk about what he could see in front of him at the present moment. This revelation helped our relationship! So thank you for reminding your readers to be curious about people and engage them in conversation that matter to them.

I love how the book was written: full of stories with a straightforward message.  It shows your generous, humble and wise spirit . . . plus your funny sense of humor.  Nice Book!
—Jane C.
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A Sweet Christmas Story

Posted on December 24, 2010 by Mark Scharenbroich

Finding a quiet spot at the New York LaGuardia airport before an afternoon flight home to Minneapolis on December 23rd can be a difficult task.  However, after searching for twenty minutes, our 23-year-old daughter, Kate found a quiet hallway at the far end of the concourse.

The only other person in the area was a twenty something young woman who was curled into a corner. Kate noticed that the other girl was quietly sobbing to herself, looking at her phone and generally very distraught.

Kate thought for a moment and reached into her travel bag and pulled out a dark chocolate bar that she always keeps on hand in the event of a chocolate emergency.  Kate approached the crying woman, put the chocolate bar on top of her backpack and said, “Chocolate always makes everything better.”

Through her tears the young woman said, “Thanks, that’s really sweet of you” then packed it into her bag and headed down the concourse.  Kate left the concourse minutes later and headed down to board her flight.

After Kate boarded her flight, she was amazed to see the young woman who was sobbing in the hallway was the last passenger to board the plane to Minneapolis.  Even stranger, the woman was seated in the middle seat right in front of Kate.  However, as she boarded, she didn’t notice Kate right behind her.

Just as the flight was getting ready to land, Kate over heard  the young woman telling the passenger next to her, “I was on the standby list for this flight home to Minneapolis and the airline was just jerking me around not giving me any information.  All I wanted to do was to get home for Christmas and this was the last flight out.

“I broke down in tears sitting by myself when the sweetest thing happened.  A really wonderful girl just came over to me, gave me a chocolate bar and told me that everything was going to be all right.  It was so nice.”  The young woman had no idea that Kate was right behind her.

Nice Bike is about acknowledging others, honoring them and making a meaningful connection.  Kate didn’t need to find out what was wrong or why the other girl was crying, she just wanted to connect with her during a tough time.

This Christmas, give the gift of Nice Bike.  Acknowledge, honor and connect with someone not because of what it does for you but because of what it can do for others.  That is a true gift.

Nice Bike, Kate.

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“He Cut Me Off”

Posted on December 2, 2010 by Mark Scharenbroich

After reading my book, Nice Bike: Making Meaningful Connections on the Road of Life, George Kremer sent me the following:

Last summer, driving on University Avenue in St. Paul, a guy in a shiny big car pulled up quickly behind me, passed me on the right, slowed a bit in front of me, and then pulled way over to the far left lane. I honked, didn’t have to but hell, he cut me off! As fate would have it, we’re side by side at a stoplight a couple blocks later. His windows are down and so were mine. He was a big dude. In any of the manly arts except for a spelling bee he’d have bettered me in pretty short order. He looked right at me.  I glared back at him, smiled and said: “Nice set of wheels.” Sure enough, he nodded, smiled and said “Thanks”. Pause. “Didn’t mean to cut you off back there. Sorry, man.” No way, had I not sent forth a complimentary message would that have been the same verbal exchange that he and I might have otherwise had.  Nice Bike not only creates connections but also kept me out of the hospital.

Nice Bike, book reader, George Kremer

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Jiffy Lube Guy

Posted on November 16, 2010 by Mark Scharenbroich

It’s become an ongoing pet peeve of mine.  Not a big deal, just annoying.  It happens every time I get my car’s oil changed at my local Jiffy Lube.  Since I use synthetic oil, my car can go 5,000 miles between changes instead of 3,000 miles with regular oil.

However, every time the crew at Jiffy Lube changes the oil and puts a reminder tag in my window, they list the 3,000 instead of 5,000 for the next change.  In the past, I have always made a point of asking the crew at Jiffy to make sure to indicate my next change at 5,000 miles. I always got the same response, “No problem” yet it always was a problem because they would forget.

The last time I went into Jiffy Lube, I gave the young man my same requests, noting that it gets by most of his fellow workers.  His response was different, “I am so sorry to hear about the past service sir, I will personally see to it and make sure it’s done right.”  His name was Elliott, a year out of high school but he understood customer service well beyond his years.

He took responsibility to make sure it was done right.  He honored me with a personal promise to get it right – which he did.  In fact, before I drove out, he made a point to walk over and point out the correct figure on the reminder tab.

The three action steps of Nice Bike are acknowledge, honor and connect.  This young Jiffy Lube crew member did all three, he acknowledged the problem, he honored me by making a personal promise and he connected with me as a customer.

Nice Bike, Jiffy Lube guy.

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Better Than Applause

Posted on October 26, 2010 by Mark Scharenbroich

Recently, I spoke in Chicago for Encompass, one of the largest personal insurance brands in America.

My presentation closed out the three day meeting of 200 key leaders and management for Encompass. After my presentation, Cynthia Young, the President of Encompass wrapped up the meeting.

No doubt about it, Cynthia is a dynamic leader. She has a clear vision for the company, a keen ability to surround herself with talented people, and she knows how to connect with her team.

Like most company presidents, Cynthia wanted to thank the team that worked so hard in putting together a great meeting. At most meetings like this, the President will ask the planning team to stand-up and, as their names are scrolling on a screen up front, the audience applauds for 8-10 seconds. It is the norm.

Nice Bike is beyond the standard. It is making connections that move people. Cynthia went beyond the standard. She asked all of the 12 planning team members to stand-up, and then she said, “I want to thank each and every one of the team members for putting in so much time to make this such a turning point meeting for all of us.

“Now, most of you know either the team member’s face, their title or what they do for Encompass, but each of these people has so much more going on in their lives and I wanted to take a moment to not only say thank you, but to share something about each of these talented people …”

Cynthia went on to share something about each person’s hobbies, their family, their service in the community – something unique about each and every person. Her comments were specific, interesting and very complimentary. No notes. It was all from the head and from the heart.

I have never seen people beam so much in my life. The room lit up with their smiles. Why does Cynthia Young have such a dedicated team at Encompass? She recognizes, validates and connects with each and every team member.

Nice Bike, Cynthia Young.

Posted in Acknowledging, Connecting, Employee Motivation, Honoring, Leadership, Management, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment