Did Cooking Demo at My Cluster Meeting.. :O(

[Muppetgal]

Basically I'm a consultant, and offered to do a cooking demo (fake show) at our cluster meeting this month to let my director take a break and to get feedback on my recruiting/hosting bids.

Half way through one of the other consultants stopped me....said I wiped my knife on the same tea towel I had wiped my just cleaned hands on. She went on about due diligence etc etc right in the middle of my presentation and completely threw me off. I was so embarrassed. I've been on the team longer than the rest of the people that were in the room, and I felt completely humiliated.

I know she was trying to be "helpful" but bloody hell, it's nerve racking enough trying to do a cooking show in a limited amount of time, to a group of your peers and then have someone come out with a remark like that. (and I KNOW I've seen my director wipe her knife on her tea towel...and that she only ever has one!)

I feel like crap, and don't think I'll be offering to do a demo again. I didn't really get much positive feedback at all, which makes me wonder if I'm any good at this. The thing my director had to say to me was that I touched the top of my nose 4 times...we figured out afterwards I had a wee fly away hair that was tickling me. Fair comment but couldn't people find something NICE to say before ripping into me???? I was up last night until 2am because I couldn't sleep I was so nervous about this!!

Fwiw though, I did do 6 hosting bids and 8 recruiting bids...why I'm not getting any recruiting leads I'll never know! Maybe I touch my nose too much!

 

[dannyzmom]

Sorry they were so rough on you. When we do demos at our meetings we insist everyone offer at least one positive before they offer a negative criticism. Maybe you could suggest that for next time.
PS what are hosting bids and recruiting bids?

 

[BethCooks4U]

We drive ourselves crazy worrying about such things. Do as my aunt told me when I was expecting my first child.

Listen politely, thank them for their advice and then do as you feel is correct.

You will now be very observant of when you start to touch your nose. The tea towel thing is an individual preference. There are many people in the world that never considered using 2 - one for hands and one for tools. If it is the practice in your area or if it is your preference then do that.

Use this bad experience to help you to know what NOT to do to someone else. We all should try to find positive things to say when critiquing someone. Give a positive or two always before a negative. But we do need to hear the negative too or we won't improve or fix what isn't right.

Shake it off. Don't lose any more sleep over their rudeness.

Do your best and you will succeed and have fun doing it!

Carolyn: A recruting bid is a recruiting line.

 

[Muppetgal]

Basically doing my cooking demo I talked about hosting a show 6 times, and joining the business 8 times...in different ways, subtle hints or quite obvious ones. From what I've been told you need to mention something 6 times before it really sinks in, so the goal on our team is to get 6 of each in per cooking show.


The tea towel thing wasn't brought about in a throw away manner...she made it very clear what I was doing was wrong and that I could be SUED should anyone decide to take me up on it.

I'm a bit emotional about this whole thing...doesn't help I'm 7 months pregnant I suppose, and honestly I've not been feeling all that great about my business as of late and could have REALLY done with some positive stuff from this. I had to ask someone to count my recruit/host bids and was pleaseed with the result, but it wasn't said "wow, you did this many of each! well done!" it was more like " you did 6 host/8 recruit....and touched your nose 4 times" (although I think the nose thing came first)

 

[dannyzmom]

Frankly it sounds like the girl who was spouting off at you has her own insecurity issues if she has to get her kicks by making someone else feel bad. I bet you did a fabulous demo!
And tell me...how did you work booking and recruiting in 6 and 8 times?? That's awesome!! TEACH ME!!

 

[AJPratt]

MuppetGal: She's probably just a clot and doesn't know how rude she was... or does she? Hmmm... Hey, everyone gets a turn to stand up there, and her turn is a-coming. Hopefully no one will be that rude to her.

If you are talking from your heart and having fun, then I am sure you are doing a great job.

I know when I made something a my cluster meeting, I forgot the eggs, and had to pull it out of the oven, then put it back in, and realized I forgot the water and then put it back in again, and it came out great. And I am the most experienced in my cluster. I just laughed it off even though I was quite embarrassed. And speaking in front of your peers in the hardest.

 

[tlennhoff]

Give me a break on the towel thing. It is ludicrous in my opinion that anyone would sue you other than your fellow consultant. Sounds like nitpicking to me - you wiped a knife on a towel & you touched your nose. If that was all they could find wrong with your presentation I'd say you did excellent.

Let your virtual "cluster" give you some positive feedbacK. Way to go on offering to do a demo like that, it can be used as a learning experience for everyone. They need to be looking for the positive as well as the negative as a big part of the cluster meetings is to get us psyched to do our best this month and I am certain that you did lots of stuff right. Wow, you worked into your conversation 6/8 booking/recruiting comments that is excellent.

This summer was tough for a lot of people so don't give up on PC yet. Why did you start doing PC? What used to get you excited? How can you get that excitement back?

 

[Muppetgal]

Thanks everyone...I'm not sure why she decided to rip into me in the middle of my demo (I was limited to 30 minutes as it was!) I guess it was just a shock over what she said and that my director didn't pipe in with anything to help diffuse the situation. I basically stood there red faced chopping broccoli (thank god for the stress relief of a food chopper!) until I found the courage to pick up and move on.

Let's see if I can remember my bids from my demo tonight (these change depending on the show, but this is what I THINK I said

My host bids:
1)introduce and thank host, who I met at _____'s party (hopefully that past host is there), where she earned £100 in free product.
2)Hosting binder...info on specials for next few months for hosts
3)Food chopper - "Pampered Chef give more of these away than we sell."
4)Stoneware - "once you start using stoneware you want ALL of it. If you host a party you could get some of it for free, half price or discounted....or better yet I decided to join the business so that I could earn it for free!"
5)Knife - set of three, count as one 1/2 price item when you host a party
6)wish list - if you are like me your wish list is probably most things, so the sensible thing to do is book a party to get some things for free!

Recruiting bids:
1) Host binder has recruit stuff at the back. I talk about my reasons for doing PC at the beginning of my show and direct them to look for my wedding photo (which is at the start of the recruiting stuff). There is a wish list with stuff highlighted, which basically is the starter kit, the super starter bonusses and recruiting bonusses...which PC give to you for starting your business off on the right foot! £90 for all the highlighted items, plus commission, all fitting in your own schedule!
2) Cheese grater - Want to have a dinner party and be posh and serve fresh parmesan to my guests...just like in Italy, which is where PC is sending the UK team next year. Talk about trip to Rome briefly
3)Small Mix N Scraper - catalogue items with stars = super starter kit, explain
4)Pampered CHEF - Stands for consultant having extraordinary fun - use this when you make a mistake or drop something!
5) see host bid number 4
6) anytime there is laughing in the crowd I use this time to say how much fun my job is...I get paid to leave my husband at home to put the kids to bed while he thinks I'm away working hard. Little does he know I'm getting a night out!
7) Christmas gift ideas - are you worried about how you are going to pay for Christmas? This job is a fantastic part time opportunity to help make sure there are no left over bills in January!
8) Any item I've recieved for free - (ie muffin stoneware, simple additions etc etc) Mention that Pampered Chef send me products every other month for free, just for doing my job!

Not done tonight:
I also go through the questions on the draw slips (recruit, hosting, fundraising) with them before handing them out. At order time I go through this again, just in case the "NO" means, "no not now but maybe later."
I have a booking board that goes around the room as well, which shows the host benefits for the month. I only have two months ahead for booking...I don't like booking farther ahead than that unless there are extreme circumstance (like December/January I'm not booking because I'm due a baby, so I'll be booking Feb/March as of next month)

 

[gilliandanielle]

I wouldn't have the balls to do this in the first place, so great job! I think that if you are happy with your show and business that it should never be critiqued!! Isn't this the base of OUR business? Run it like you want!

 

[Muppetgal]

I wouldn't have the balls to do this in the first place, so great job! I think that if you are happy with your show and business that it should never be critiqued!! Isn't this the base of OUR business? Run it like you want!

ah, but what this lady was pointing out is something that is in our kitchen agreement...to do with food handling etc. Health and Safety and all that.

Guess I'll start taking two towels to each show! In theory she should have ripped into my director last month for the same thing (only one towel) but also using the Suds Pump without water to rinse...I remember reading somewhere (maybe on this board) that it's just as bad to have soap on your hands.

And maybe, just maybe, that's why my director didn't pipe up when all this was going on, because she knows she has those bad habits too (I'm sure I've learned some from her)

Thanks for the comments, I'm starting to feel a bit better, and realising what I said during the 30 minutes I had to present (by typing it all out for you) HAS made me feel I'm doing an okay job afterall. I've never had a customer or host complain nor have I had anyone refuse the food!

AJ - I did a show on Friday night and put the recipe in the oven then came back to start cleaning the table to make a space for my "office", only to realise the muffins I made didn't have eggs in them as I'd forgotten them!! I now have an egg free recipe for apple and pear muffins though...they turned out fine!

 

[gilliandanielle]

I didn't see anything about not using one towel but two in the agreement! LOL! Use your best judgement, and have fun!!

 

[Muppetgal]

I didn't see anything about not using one towel but two in the agreement! LOL! Use your best judgement, and have fun!!

LOL. maybe I should point that out to her.

The silly thing is, she was so concerned over a knife with a bit of pepper getting wiped on a clean tea towel that I had wiped my CLEAN hands on, but in the UK they are infamous for washing dishes and NOT rinsing the soap off before letting them drip dry. My hubby is always on at me for wasting water by rinsing, but being North American it's something I was brought up to do. She's from the UK.

 

[gilliandanielle]

Yuk! That is gross! Don't the dishes taste soapy??

 

[AJPratt]

No... It just runs off.

 

[beepampered]

I'm with Gillian. I would never do a demo in front of people who know what I should be doing. They would be shocked at how "wrong" I did things. I'm impressed that you even agreed to present in front of your peers.

And to do that many recruit/booking lines is great in such a short amount of time!

 

[pamperedgirl3]

First of all, I'm still wondering why it's so bad to wipe a knife on a towel that you dried your CLEAN hands on?????

Second, when I was a teacher, I was always told on report cards to try to list one positive comment before a negative comment--for exactly the same reasons as to how you are feeling. I think your cluster probably could have been more constructive in their comments & definitely could have said more positives.

Good job being brave enough to do the demo in front of them!

 

[Ann F]

In our cluster one of us always does a demo. It's TERRIFYING when it's your turn. In our group, only our director mentions anything negative, and she does it in a good way--after praising our good points. We all learn from it, good and bad. It's really cool when the director says something like "Wow! I've never thought about that. Let me write that down!"

(I'm speaking of our Sr Dir, not myself...After I posted I noticed my signature and wanted to clear that up!)

 

[lizcooks4u]

Cluster Demoing....LOL not a word!

We drive ourselves crazy worrying about such things. Do as my aunt told me when I was expecting my first child.

Listen politely, thank them for their advice and then do as you feel is correct.

You will now be very observant of when you start to touch your nose. The tea towel thing is an individual preference. There are many people in the world that never considered using 2 - one for hands and one for tools. If it is the practice in your area or if it is your preference then do that.

Use this bad experience to help you to know what NOT to do to someone else. We all should try to find positive things to say when critiquing someone. Give a positive or two always before a negative. But we do need to hear the negative too or we won't improve or fix what isn't right.

Shake it off. Don't lose any more sleep over their rudeness.

Do your best and you will succeed and have fun doing it!

Carolyn: A recruting bid is a recruiting line.

I couldn't have said it better

 

[PCGINA]

ah, but what this lady was pointing out is something that is in our kitchen agreement...to do with food handling etc. Health and Safety and all that.

Sooooooo - is she aN Environmental Health Inspector by day and a PC Consultant by night??? I think you should tell your Director that because of the "mistake" you made, it may be advantageous for HER to do the next demo. See if she makes an boo-boos!!!

I was asked by my Director to do a demo at our next Cluster Meeting - NOW I'm a little worried. I try to NOT interject my opinions while my fellow consultant is speaking or doing a demo. BUT we all seem to do that. We are all prone to GIVE ADVICE - but tact and timing is everything.

BE NICE!! to one another...

 

[jmabner]

Sounds like they all need to get over themselves. A show is supposed to be fun. I only use one towel, never would have thought about doing anything else. A demo at a cluster meeting is ALL about learning how someone else does it, and learning from each other. It should NEVER be about what you did wrong. If there were things that you could have done better those should have been brought up seperately and in person, not in front of the whole group. I would tell my director how much this has deflated your attitude and encourage everyone to refrain from doing it in the future. I have done several demos in front of several clusters and I always mess something up. It's a lot harder to do it in front of peers. I've seen good demos and bad demos, but I always learn something that I can incorporate into my own style!

KUDOS to you!!!! It's hard to do that! Smile and pat yourself on the back!

 

[jrstephens]

Sounds like they were taking their on frustrations out on you! Maybe they were just jealous of your awesome job and felt the urge to nit-pick. I am still shaking my head over the towel thing!!!

 

[MicheleC]

Thanks for posting those host and recruiting bids! I'm trying to touch on these items three times and sometimes I don't even get one until the end of the show ! I think putting that many lines in is great. I'm printing this out and distributing to my team so we can all work on getting more of this info into our shows.

I agree with the posts above that demos are hard to do in front of your peers and they should always be about what can you get from others vs. showing someone what they did wrong!

Beth, I love the advice from your aunt about thanking them for their advice. I got that same advice when I was pregnant with my first and thta is one piece of wisdom I pass on to any newly expecting parents.

 

[AJPratt]

Jennifer: You are right. It reminds me of one of Belinda Ellworth's cds where she's talking about someone being recognized for their sales and how someone leans over to someone else and says, "Yeah, but she doens't work..." Her main point was to set your own goals, don't make excuses and don't compare yourself to others. Just do YOUR own thing!

 

[yummy4tummy]

Sooooooo - is she aN Environmental Health Inspector by day and a PC Consultant by night???

Good One! This girl would have a field day in my house! Unless you are a total germiphobe it is totally natural to do other movements with your hands. I've observed things on Martha, Rachael, and other televised cooking shows that were more questionable than this.

First of all, I'm still wondering why it's so bad to wipe a knife on a towel that you dried your CLEAN hands on?????

This is what I was thinking when I first started reading this post. It's not like you were picking your nose and then going on with your demo. You could have told her that, "What doesn't kill us makes us stronger" and you were doing your part to build her anti-bodies. Don't let the nit-pickers get you down.
Valky

 

[Rebeccascabinet]

She would have died at my demo for our meeting. I was fine til I got up there and broke out into a huge sweat the moment I saw everyone! I didn't think I would be that nervous, but then I got concerned with sweating into the food. Fortunately I think people were so worried I'd sweat in their food they probably didn't notice all the other wrong things I was doing! For the record, I didn't "drip" anywhere, but I sure was majorily nervous. Afterwards it was pretty funny. Someone did mention why I don't wear my hair up. I just said that isn't the way I do things. I never wear my hair up for anything- just told her we all have our own ways for doing shows and that is why we come to the meetings to learn, plus I've never had a "hair" problem in any of my cooking shows or when I cook for my family.

 

[melindag]

Maybe my cluster meetings are run differently than most....but in the time I have been a consultant (5 years), my cluster has gone through some changes, and I've been a part of 3 different groups of consultants. We have someone, do a recipe every month....and the focus is less on what the consultant is SAYING, they never go through their normal show routine....the emphasis has always been on working through the RECIPE....what worked, what didn't, is it a good show recipe, etc.

In other words, it seems our focus has always been on the "mechanics" of the recipe not to put the consultant on the hot seat with pulling off a word-for-word demo.

I guess all cluster meetings are run differently.

I would never want to do a demo like you did and be critiqued like that....I always feel that way when my mother is at one of my shows!

 

[Rebeccascabinet]

Thats interesting how each cluster is run diffrently. We focus on on words - what we say while we are demoing and less on the recipe.

 

[AJPratt]

Thats interesting how each cluster is run diffrently. We focus on on words - what we say while we are demoing and less on the recipe.

That's the same with us... I was told "Focus on the tools because that's what you're selling."

 

[Rebeccascabinet]

Me too how funny is that!

 

[rennea]

BummerSorry this happened to you!! Try to find positive in it, everyone there should have said at least one nice thing but with that said now food safe is on the mind which is a GOOD THING. In my kitchen at work we would never use the same towel twice. (or at home) Maybe try to bring a sani gel to your shows and if you catch yourself touching your face use that to sani. Remember safety first!! At home I change my towel twice a day. One for drying hands, one for dishes and always have a spare towel if I'm cooking/baking. And I use paper towels all the time.
"Staff." infection is spreadable and easy to do so. When people get a food born illness this is usually the bacteria that makes them sick. This is something that I am always telling my chefs about. They scratch there nose, touch there hair etc...............

As for getting sued, interesting I think that she is a twit!! And for sure next meeting she should have to do the demo!! Keep your head up!!
Think of this as learning something very important

 

[rennea]

BummerSorry this happened to you!! Try to find positive in it, everyone there should have said at least one nice thing but with that said now food safe is on the mind which is a GOOD THING. In my kitchen at work we would never use the same towel twice. (or at home) Maybe try to bring a sani gel to your shows and if you catch yourself touching your face use that to sani. Remember safety first!! At home I change my towel twice a day. One for drying hands, one for dishes and always have a spare towel if I'm cooking/baking. And I use paper towels all the time.
"Staff." infection is spreadable and easy to do so. When people get a food born illness this is usually the bacteria that makes them sick. This is something that I am always telling my chefs about. They scratch there nose, touch there hair etc...............

As for getting sued, interesting I think that she is a twit!! And for sure next meeting she should have to do the demo!! Keep your head up!!
Think of this as learning something very important

 

[rennea]

BummerSorry this happened to you!! Try to find positive in it, everyone there should have said at least one nice thing but with that said now food safe is on the mind which is a GOOD THING. In my kitchen at work we would never use the same towel twice. (or at home) Maybe try to bring a sani gel to your shows and if you catch yourself touching your face use that to sani. Remember safety first!! At home I change my towel twice a day. One for drying hands, one for dishes and always have a spare towel if I'm cooking/baking. And I use paper towels all the time.
"Staff." infection is spreadable and easy to do so. When people get a food born illness this is usually the bacteria that makes them sick. This is something that I am always telling my chefs about. They scratch there nose, touch there hair etc...............

As for getting sued, interesting I think that she is a twit!! And for sure next meeting she should have to do the demo!! Keep your head up!!
Think of this as learning something very important

 

[baychef]

Sorry that this happened to you. I bet everyone learned something good from your demo and learned how not to handle a situation that the director found in error. Doing a demo in front of everyone is a very intimidating experience. You feel like those that have been doing this longer may not learn something new or that you may make a mistake. That is really not the case, however! No matter where we are in our business, we can always learn something new
.
If I was in your director's shoes and felt the way she did, I would have handled it in a different manner. I went to a new consultant's first show and was horrified when she licked a spoon during her demo!!! How did I handle it?
I made up training sheet on proper food handling, sanitation, etc. taken from The Pampered Chef Recipe for Success. I did not point it out to the consultant because she was so nervous and I wanted her to not get discouraged in her business. There are ways of handling things that we may think inappropreate.
Not sure if wiping your knife on the clean towel was all that bad, but I have a 30 year Food Service career and have been a trainer for a 10 hour Restaurant Association Sanitation course.

Here are the facts:
Each state has their own health regulations and,yes, a customer that can prove that you served food that caused them to have food poisoning CAN sue the establishment that served them the food. Whether this applies to us as demonstrators, I am not sure.
The largest cause of food borne illness are humans. Many of us do not realize when we touch our faces, etc. To point this out in front of others is humiliating. If I notice that I have touched my face or touched the trash can, etc., I do stop my demo and wash my hands with soap and water before proceeding.
Am I germaphonbic...absolutely not! However, what we do in our own homes is our own business. When we are dealing with food on a professional basis, we must be very aware of everything we do.
Also, I have heard many hosts say: "I would never have that consultant back because she dropped a tool on the floor and just rinsed it off"...or I have heard of one that just picked it up off the floor and started using it in her demo again!
Also, I have heard that someone's tools were dirty and they will never have that person demo again.
We have all heard and maybe used the "5 second rule" in our homes...I can guarentee that when you are handling food to serve to others...there is a different perspective taken.

If you have ever had or known someone who has experienced a food borne illness, they will tell you that no matter how much they like the food, they probably aren't going to eat there again. Are we a restaurant? No, but you probably will lose business if something ever did happen.

All of this is a matter of training but not public criticism like what you have experienced. Just as the last post said, think of this as learning something very important...not just on food handling but on how to handle people! Sanitation is a very boring subject...especially the microbiology of food borne illness. But learning how bacteria, viruses, etc. can spread and make people ill is a real eye opener.

 

[Evelynt]

I was watching a "Kitchen Show Live" video once, and the consultant was Ferile Yan (sp?). She is one of PC's top consultants. Well, she wiped her nose with her towel! I laughed so hard. We are all human. Things like this certainly make us aware of everything we do at our cooking shows.
I say move on and keep having fun!
PS my in laws are from Glasgow Scotland. The name is Thackaberry.