To those who wish to get a job at CP...

*makes devil horns*

I couldn't keep lurking around.

this thread is turning into a giant mean streak reunion...niiice

*devil horns*
*** Edited 9/2/2005 6:28:48 AM UTC by Mean Streak John***

we should just start a mean streak reunion thread, ahh thats what i shall do, create that thread, for those who spent thier summer working that giant woody.

I find it kind of sad to read about so many folks complaining about the treatment of employees at CP. While I'm sure things have changed in the 28 years since I worked there, I find it hard to understand how things could get so bad. Back then I knew and worked with the folks who are now the Executives of the company - Kinzel, Keller, Falfas, and my old boss John Albino (now retired). They were all GREAT GUYS! The fact that these guys are running the company greatly impacted my decision to invest in Cedar Fair. I find it hard to believe they've changed all that much, but, you folks are obviously closer to it than I these days. Usually, the only grief I ever got was for speeding on Perimeter Rd. in a Company truck! There's no doubt that we worked HARD and LONG, but, I was treated well and any of these guys would always pop me a beer.

Things really have changed that much since you worked there, I'm sure.

I really hope they have something up their sleeves to change the way employees are treated. I think a lot of their so-called 'problems' that have been discussed at length on these message boards would pretty much go away if that was the case.

if u ask me the main problem is (and i mentioned this before) are the people they hire. Their people who dont wanna be there and it brings the atmosphere down. Its the employees who make it a bad place to work not CP. I wouldnt even call it a bad place, its fun, but the fun doesnt happen you have to make it.

Put yourself in the shoes of the guests (shouldnt be hard we were all guests at one point) how do you want your visit to be? I have fun with employees who interact, so thats what i did (or tried to do) i talked to as many guests as possible and joked with them all. I tried to make sure that if they had a bad experience in the park they would remember atleast one good/funny thing. Like for example, the fake booger (it was green gel of some sort) when i checked seatbelts i had this major "snot" hangin from my nose, sure I looked dumb but those people who gave me weird looks and even wiped their noses in an attempt to tell me i have a boog without bein rude and telling me, have a funny story their gonna remember for a long time "the guy who checked out lapbars had a huge booger on his nose!!" its funny, and its something they wont forget.

I got in trouble plenty of times for "interacting with guests" we were told we couldnt talk over the mic unless it was a speil on the wave swinger--completly understandable but we got way too many guest compliments. If there were 2 people working the swings when I did speils (and a few others did it too) we would do the whole speil but it took time for all 50 seats to be checked so in that time guests were bored, you can tell because their swinging into each other and what not and yell "start the ride" so we would go "(insert name here) is checking your seat belts everyone say 'hi (insert name here)!'" and stuff like that we got compliments people saying "you guys are good and made the ride fun, keep up the great work"

so i guess in the sense that management doesnt like that (and in our eyes it was they dont want us to make sure the guests are having a good time) I could see it dropping morale because its the same speil over and over and over and makes teh day drag which could cause problems with people hating how things are done.

I can go on and on and on with this. if i bored anyone im sorry, the point im trying to make is its not really CP who make it a abd job its all in how you do the job---if you have fun without crossing any lines (never insult anyone, never hurt anyone etc...) then its a great, fun job. If you just go there thinking its automatically going to be fun its a abd job and by not having fun you blame CP for not making your summer enjoyable and that is exactly what people do.

But when management yells at you and says "you cant do that" even though you didnt do any harm to anyone and people are complimenting you and your doing the job exactly how you should be but with alittle extra twist to make sure the guests are having the best time of their life then it makes you feel lousy that the fun your having is getting you in trouble and thats what makes teh job suck. (it also didnt help publishing an old speil that dodgem used to use in the BTL paper..the speil in everyway insulted people--you start to think if they could that why cant we? it was a speil from 79 i believe...)

alright, im out, i just wrote 3 chapters haha...

John, I remember reading the Dodgem spiel in BTL and I was shocked.

I remember reading that the thing about spieling is that you have to be saying only the things that the guests need to listen to, like saftey instructions. If you start talking about silly things over the microphones the guests will stop paying attention and won't listen at the time that they are supposed to be. Of course, if they're going to enforce that rule, they might want to make some of the sound systems a little better so people can actually understand what they're saying. ;-)

oh yea dude, definatly do the right speil, im not saying you should say silly stuf and im not saying do it all the time, but in the case of the swings sometimes it takes the person checking seatbellts quite a while to do so because people are trying to take stuffed animals with them or purses, or bags etc...and we have to wait for them to get up and put it over by the fence it just takes a while, by that time the speiling is done and what needed to be said has been said. And thats when people start yelling "COME ON ALREADY" you know thier bored and not enjoying it so i feel like as a ride op its my job to make it fun, thats where i would say "by the way everyone say hi to (insert name)..hes the guy checkin your seatbelts)" and the kids would giggle at this and be like "Hi" and then they start talking to him and it just seemed to make everything more fun.

Interaction is fun, and the guests love it.

Interaction makes the guests day, but management, for whatever reason, doesn't like it. I guess they view it as a safety hazard, or something.

That's exactly what I was thinking. I don't see anything wrong saying, "Make to sure to say hi to (insert name here) as they check your seatbelt."

I did tons of stuff like that over the summer. On Sky Ride we'd tell people with flip flops that they're shoes untied. They loved it! Or there was this one guy who would always say "Ladies first" to a cabin full of like preteen guys, and then point to one of them.

On Millennium at unload dispatch I would be like, "Don't forget about Snoopy's Summer Spectacular which starts in just a little over 8 hours, better go get a good seat on the midway now! It is the tallest and fastest laser show in the park."

On MF it was always fun to have fun with the guests, like when the train came into unload sometimes I would say, "You guys wanna go again?" and then after they cheered for like 5 seconds I would say, "Well, unbuckle your seatbelt, pull up on the lap bar, go out the exit, then back through the entrance and I'll see you back here in about an hour and a half!"

Or one the reeeeeally busy days, when the line would be like 2 and a half hours, I'd be at unload dispatch and I'd say, "Welcome back riders, how was the 2 and a half hour wait??" in a really excited voice.

I have a feeling I put a lot of smiles on people's faces, even though my one guest complaint had to with spieling.

oh man dude i did speil violations left and right, i advertised snoopy...i remmeber this dude had an iron maiden shirt on and i threw a "Up The Irons" in my speil..and even this dude who had a jim morrison shirt on i noted that in the speils and he got all excited because he knew i was talking to him directly.

i just got really ticked one time we got yelled at for goin "lets make some noise wave swingers!" during the ride and people started yellin and cheering ON THE SWINGS...sometimes it would be as loud as dragster after they say "how was your ride?" it was unbelievable that people were having that much fun and they would keep riding and riding and complimenting us. we got in trouble when management heard us. so one time (alright here we go to the higher ups reading this haha their gonna love this one) after we got yelled at people who were cheerin while riding i would speil to them during the ride "Please do not have fun on the wave swinger, cedar point does not want you to" and another time while checking seatbelts a guest goes "how you doin john?" i was like "sorry im not allowed to interact with guests...." and walked away

Yikes...I mean that's kinda funny, but yikes....lol

From someone who has been going to the park since 1966, the one major difference I've noticed over the years, and mainly in the past 2-3 years, is the lack of interaction with guests.

There are those who still interact...I guess whether they are supposed to or not. I loved the "top thrill mean streak" spiels we got over the summer...and the fellow doing the spiel on Raptor on Sunday was hilarious. To me, when the ride ops are interacting in a good way, it means they are having fun and it passes on to the guests.

So why is Management trying to stop this interaction?

Agree.

One word, OldCPer:

Lawyers.

MrScott (who seems to be in a "one word" type of mood.

Cedar Point probably also gets a lower insurance rate if spiel violations aren't caught.

Park op loves hearing about them. Someone at MF's entrance said during mechanical downtime "Millennium Force is not safe."
Better yet at Magnum "We're going to take you up 205 feet and then drop you 666 feet to the fiery pits of hell."

The worst I've ever said to was not a spiel. A younger girl asked me "Am I going to die?" She was already strapped in and not going anywhere. I checked her lapbar and seatbelt then responded with "Of course!.............. But not at Cedar Point."

I never left a negative impression doing stuff like that. Heck, I've explained why the ride was down many times. I probably could have gotten in trouble for doing stuff like that though I didn't care. I simply found the most tactful ways of having fun. In doing so I was able to turn many guest's days around, or at least give them a laugh. I've seen guests upset over a wide variety of reasons. I would try to help them in any way I could.

I was far from perfect though. I had my bad days. One of my worst periods was nearing the end of a month that I worked 75+ hours per week and didn't get a day off. Never have I ever been so excited to "only" work a 9 hour shift. :) Many nights I did a controlled fall into bed. I was completely physically and mentally drained.

It was times like those that management's ill decisions had the worst negative effect. There are always reasons behind the decisions but usually backed with good intensions. Sometimes the solution is worse than the problem. Other times Safety weights in with key importance.

It was times like those that management's ill decisions had the worst negative effect. There are always reasons behind the decisions but usually backed with good intensions. Sometimes the solution is worse than the problem.

This is very true. Management follows these strict rules and regulations. They have policies, and more policies for those policies. In my opinion they have made their job tougher then it should be. I could write 100 pages of the decisions and changes that supervision and management made at Millennium Force this season alone that had a negative effect on the crew. There were numerous crew members removed from our ride for no good reason.

I've got lots of stories and if you want to hear them feel free to PM me. To finish, management makes these decisions that hurt the ride locations and crews because they never go out to the rides enough to see the crews and how things are done. They make blind decisions and won't let the TL or ATL of the rides make some changes that would have a better effect on their crew.

Greg, you should write a book.