25/40 - Don't Smile Until Halloween

One of the most shocking parts of my past to most people is that I used to be a licensed professional bus driver. Texas A&M University is the 2nd largest land grant school in the country and when I was in school had a fleet of over 120 buses that ran 20+ routes on and off campus from 6am until 2am for students, faculty, and university staff to get around our huge campus.
I started off as a bus driver on campus for the transportation department. It was amazing how many hilarious things I observed from my perch at the front of a massive maroon and white bus.

I heard about how crazy the night before was for people who didn't think the driver could hear them talking about their date in full detail. I watched a woman run from the parking lot to try and catch my bus and have the whole bus watching while we waited only to slip and fall and have her book bag full land beside her and explode into a plume of papers flying everywhere. I even had a guy jump off the side of a curb while looking over his shoulder and slam directly into the side of my parked bus. Not sure how I snuck up on him.
But one of my favorite lessons happened when I transitioned from being a campus bus driver to being a yellow school bus driver for the local school district.
The pay was quite a bit better and the hours amazing - No nights, no weekends, no holidays. And, I became "Mr. Andy" the bus driver and it was the most fun job I'd ever had at that point.
One of the old grizzled bus drivers pulled me aside one of my first mornings in the bus barn and said,
"You're new, they always go after the new drivers. Don't smile until Halloween."
And boy was he right. Every route that I was assigned, students as young as 5 would tell me shortcuts for their route, what kind of radio they were supposed to be listening to, and that they really didn't need to stay seated, they were used to standing and being able to hang their arms out the window to wave to their parents.
"Don't smile until Halloween" kept ringing in my head and I was determined to follow through. I drove the route in the order that was typed out by the bus dispatchers, I made them listen to old school country and not Kandy95, and one time I had to slow down from going 70 mph on the highway and pull over to get their attention and get their butts back in their seats.
The biggest challenge I had was "Mr. Casey" - another bus driver who outranked me and have the Monday, Wednesday, Friday schedule for the route that I drove on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
"Mr. Casey lets us listen to rap music"
"Mr. Casey knows the shortcuts."
"Mr. Casey doesn't care if we stand up in the aisle."
I liked Casey, but he was making my job tough. But I stayed consistent well into October and was still aiming at my Halloween quest.
One day I walk into the bus barn on Monday morning and see that I had been given the Mon/Wed/Fri shifts along with the Tues/Thurs shifts for the route that I'd split with Mr. Casey. It turns out, by being the kids' friend first and letting them do what they wanted instead of enforcing the rules, he'd lost control and couldn't get it back. Parents had started to call in about how rowdy the bus was when they saw it coming down their street or when they'd seen Mr. Casey driving their kids through town.
It was right before Halloween.
I didn't know how good that was going to be for me.
Kids bring treats for their favorite bus driver on Halloween, cards for Thanksgiving, and gifts for Christmas.
I eventually started smiling, but by that point, me and the kids on this route knew what to expect from each other and that it wasn't going to change every other day.
I think about this a lot now in hiring teams and coaching new clients. There are a million people in the world that can be their friend, I am the only person who can be their boss or their coach and I need to make sure I earn their respect more than earn their friendship. Building a consistent demeanor in the early days of a new relationship can set everyone up for success in the future.