It probably started when my favorite diner served my coffee cold three visits in a row. “Why can’t I get a hot cup of coffee?” I thought. “This is the Quality Diner.” After all, I always left a nice tip. In fact, I had become so accustomed to leaving the suggested tip, that I didn’t connect it with good service. My bad.

That event must have scrambled the synapses in my brain. Suddenly, I could not get quality off my mind. One quality thought led to another, and soon I realized I might be acting strangely to other people. So, I tried hiding my quality thoughts from others, but that only worked for a short time. I even had quality dreams.

At first, I applied my quality thoughts only at work. I asked my supervisor, “Why do we make six copies of the daily absentee report when only two are required? and “Why do we enter the date three times on an order form?” He didn’t have a satisfactory answer.

After a week of this, he suggested I spend more time concentrating on just doing my own work, and let the rest of the organization do theirs. I finally got a reason from one of the old-timers—“because we’ve always done it that way.” That did make some distorted sense, but it didn’t satisfy my appetite for quality.

 …