I think that other people’s time is valuable. I think that my time is valuable. Therefore, if I am late to a meeting or for an appointment, I apologize. A month ago I was 15 minutes late for the doctor – I offered to pay the fee and reschedule, after I had called ahead while travelling to let his assistant know that I would be late.

Common professional courtesy. But this is not a common approach.

Last night I arrived with my family for our lawyer appointment 5 minutes early. Prompt. We then waited 25 minutes. At the 10 minute mark, as the receptionist was leaving (it was the end of the day) I asked:

‘Will he be much longer?’

She looked at me funny and said ‘Why, are you in a hurry?’

At that moment, I recognized what this was – a personal growth opportunity. A test of some sort.

I smiled and said ‘Actually, I have had a really long day. In fact, it has been a really long month. We are just back from England and it is a bit crazy. We would really like to get home. That is why I made an appointment’

‘Well, he is usually really punctual. Really punctual. So I am sure he will be with you as soon as possible. His last client was 30 minutes late’. She resumed packing her bag.

‘Excuse me, does that mean he will be 30 minutes late?’

‘I am not sure. I am sure he will go as fast as he can’. She stood up, grabbed her stuff and left for the day.

When we finally did enter his office, he didn’t apologize. Instead, he acted like he had known us for years (first time we met). He then went on to provide long winded explanations to everything that we were signing despite my using very polite prompts such as ‘Thanks, we understand what a deed is’, ‘Thanks, I understand how money is transferred from my bank to you in trust’ or ‘Thanks, this is the 3rd home we have bought, so we don’t need to have that explained’. He just went on and on. To make it worse, throughout the conversation he swore in front of my boys. Not big swear words, but little ones non-stop. Enough so that when we left the boys mentioned it.

To top it all off, for the last signature he looked at me, smiled and said ‘And this is the last signature. Mikey put your signature right here’.

My wife and I walked out of there and started laughing. It was a surreal experience. Of course, I also noticed this book on his shelf …. which made me laugh. Considering what he charged me, that is good margin for 6 minutes of education (LOL). He should have read a 6 minute book on professionalism.