The New Hire’s Frappe Flap

This story happened years ago when I got a job at a local location of a popular coffee shop chain near the university I was attending.

At this particular coffee chain, new employees were supposed to read the manual to get the recipes for drinks, but they were also assigned a “learning coach” to show them the ropes on their first few shifts, teach them how to steam milk, etc. There was also a specific order in which new employees were taught, starting with the “hot bar” (lattes and other espresso drinks) and then the “cold bar” (iced teas, blended drinks, and the like).

Unfortunately for me, my first day on the job happened to be the day a brand-new lower-calorie blended drink was released, and anyone could walk into the store and get a small-sized one for free. As I’m sure you can imagine, the store was a zoo. So, rather than being trained on the “hot bar”, I was shown how to make the “Frappuccino Light” and did that for the entirety of my shift.

This probably wouldn’t have been a problem, except that since I had been making drinks on the “cold bar” on my first day, I was never actually taught how to make any “hot bar” drinks (or any other “cold bar” drinks, for that matter). I muddled through, asked a lot of questions, and probably looked like an idiot, but I managed to figure out how everything worked before eventually putting in my notice six months later.

During my exit interview:

Manager: “Who was your learning coach? I don’t remember.”

Me: “What’s a learning coach?”

She nearly fell off her chair.

I did end up returning to work for that company for several years after graduating from college, and I eventually became a learning coach myself. I made sure not to abandon any new employees that were assigned to me like I had been.