Having worked at two restaurants in my life—and managed one of those—I’ve picked up a few tips along the way. These jobs were not the most enjoyable I’ve ever had, but they did have their moments. The few times customers took the time to thank me for “making their day” or to compliment me were pretty awesome, and working with a staff of high school kids (and a few grumpy adults) was often fun, too.

If you’re looking to enter the restaurant biz, whether it’s fast food or fine dining, there are a handful of tips you can use for your job, such as…

• Always, always, always smile. This is SO tedious and your face will totally need a break in the bathroom every day (at least during the first week or two), but it makes such a difference. A badly put together sandwich during rush hour at a fast food chain is a lesser offense when it’s served with a smile.
• Know that you cannot please some people. At one of my jobs, we were not allowed to put ketchup on sandwiches, for example; customers had to use the packets we provided. One demanded it and when we wouldn’t do it (according to my boss, it violated health codes or something), he took off without paying and left his food. It happens; just brush it off. You know you’re doing your job correctly.
• Know that the customer is NOT always right—but you still have to be nice about it. You really do have to be saccharine sweet to your customers, no matter how annoying or even mean they are. If you know they didn’t ask for, say, no tomato, yet they claim they did, you can simply apologize for “not hearing them.” Yeah, it’s dishonest, but it makes them happy.
• Don’t let customer service eat your soul! Don’t take anything personally. The majority of customers unfortunately do not look at you as a person but as a thing making their food. They don’t know you, they aren’t out to get you just for being you (in the majority of cases, anyway; see Clerks 2 for an example otherwise…).
• Know when to hold ‘em, and when to fold ‘em. I had a district supervisor who was a complete terror; she was one of the reasons I quit one of my jobs. There was nothing I could do to make her nicer, and though when I was a lowly peon she ignored me, when I was a manager she made it her personal quest to tell me such horrible things and speak to me like I was nothing so often that I started having nightmares about her. It was time to leave anyway, but she was definitely not worth the job. Now, if this is your dream job and you love it, you might want to fight for it instead; for me, it was a way to pay through college, and leaving didn’t mean as much.
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