In your story, the customer would perceive the service as inferior if their food was late. A cook, knowing that the service isn't really inferior (there was just one little snag), justifies a little action to put appearances back closer to reality.
That last sentence is a study for me. I see it in everybody including myself. Somehow we convince ourselves that our ideal is the normal and the actual reality is an aberation. Then we rationalize little efforts to hide the aberation.
It can be hard to acknowledge the truth about ourselves and accept the consequences. But it is very hard to improve otherwise.
(At the same time we need to be careful of imposing overly severe consequences for mistakes.)
In your story, the customer would perceive the service as inferior if their food was late. A cook, knowing that the service isn't really inferior (there was just one little snag), justifies a little action to put appearances back closer to reality.
That last sentence is a study for me. I see it in everybody including myself. Somehow we convince ourselves that our ideal is the normal and the actual reality is an aberation. Then we rationalize little efforts to hide the aberation.
It can be hard to acknowledge the truth about ourselves and accept the consequences. But it is very hard to improve otherwise.
(At the same time we need to be careful of imposing overly severe consequences for mistakes.)