When I read lucid dream's posts it hit me- the underlying issue is that no one is managing dealer performance or customer behavior, and dealer compensation does not fluctuate enough from non-performers to performers. I also believe the best managers in any business spend a lot of time hiring good fits/hard workers, more time training them/introducing company values and culture, and then they empower them...

Good managers monitor their emplyees' performance with metrics vital to their jobs AND customer feedback, and they have their employees set goals for growth and so on...

Doesn't seem like much of ^^^ is going on in any card rooms.

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Until someone wants to demolish the competition by actually running a card-room like a good business, I still think it's wise for dealers to be efficient and professional--> for their own job satisfaction and earnings.

Yeah I don't see a lot of stiffing and I do see a fair amount of big tips.

I wonder if the initial premise that any dealer can just up their game and deal faster and more accurately is really true. I've played in the same place for years, and have seen many dealers deal for many consecutive years. But other than new dealers getting faster as they gained experience, most of the veteran dealers have their individual speed and accuracy levels, and they don't really change over time.

There are some that any reg would immediately identify as great dealers--very fast, extremely accurate, able to read the people at the table and determine the appropriate amount of interaction to have with players. Others are universally known as slow and error prone, and the majority fall somewhere in the middle.

But if an average dealer tries and deal faster than his speed, often mistakes pop up. Not just in terms of speed of the pitch, but in making change, following the action, etc. i think the notion that anyone can be a super fast, error free dealer perhaps is due to the mistaken belief that dealing well is an easy job that anyone can master. But seeing how relatively few dealers consistently deal at the best levels, I think people are selling them short on what it takes to be that good a dealer. And since like any endeavor, those who excel at it make it look easy to an outsider who doesn't appreciate what it takes to perform so well.

So I wonder if the basic premise of the OP. Is really valid; i,e, dealers, deal faster and make fewer mistakes and you'll make more money. Of course in theory it's true. But I wonder if most dealers, who are likely well aware of the fact that they would make more money if they were better, actually can all become that much better.

Sort of like telling pro golfers that they just need to practice more and they can play like the top winners. All pros already practice; it's just not possible for everyone to be great at it. Like any field, there are dealers in the room that are the top 10-15% in their field. It sounds like DGAF and others want all the dealers that deal to the big games to be top 10% dealers. But maybe that isn't really possible, anymore than just telling every poker player to just play better and you'll make more money.

But I do agree that any dealer should be able to adjust their conversation level to fit the game they are in. Even at the 2/5 level I play at, it's frustrating to have to tell the dealer "it's on you" because he is still telling a player not in the hand about his bad beat from playing in a tourney last weekend. But speed and accuracy increases, I'm not so sure increasing them is as simple as telling the dealers they will get tipped better. I would think most realize that already.

This discussion sort of reminds me of an old business cartoon, where a guy walks into a business, and on the counter the sign says:

High quality--low price--quick turn around
Pick any two

Putting bad dealers in check should prob be the responsibility of their bosses- not their customers....

Plz stop putting words in my mouth when you talk about throwing cards and such...

Yes- I don't think it's fair to slow an entire game down when the majority seated are good customers...

I don't buy the talent pool thing. It's a management/culture issue more than anything imo.

Your rationalization and misdirection is wild. He tabled his hand. He made sure he got the pot. The dealer messed up and didn't care- that was the issue.

Ahhhhhh. Finally...

Someone who didn't get offended by customer feedback or fling misplaced **** at the me- tyvm. Your post is excellent imo. And I agree the compensation needs to fluctuate way more/the better dealers need to be rewarded in all ways. How do we make that happen though?

I'm thinking whoever the table captain is can maybe let the table know, "we are all adding a buck to our time in addition to this guy's regular tips because he deals fast and knows whats up."

Would ^^^ be a good idea iyo?

He did protect his hand- by tabling it. Letting a dealer grab it before pushing the pot is in fact an effort to speed up the game/not tilt the dealer. Doing anything else would be managing to the exception and not the rule- never a good idea.

Plz stop with the defensive derailing.

That's a pretty big knowledge drop. Never considered the middle ground stuff, TY.

I guess I didn't express what I was trying to say very well. All I was trying to say, in response to the idea that the dealer missed an obvious winning hand, and the assumption was that he missed it because he wasn't taking his job seriously, was that the player, who clearly does take his job seriously, allowed a dealer to actually take his cards and put them into the muck and start to push the pot to another player before stopping him. And that's a player mistake, and mistakes happen.

I think my reaction to L ucid was more that I may have interpreted his use of "harsh" as to mean berating. There are ways to inform a dealer of the seriousness of a mistake in a direct manner without being "harsh". But maybe he meant harsh as direct, not rude or belittling, I don't know.

Increasing effort in efficiency and professionalism is the premise. That's a lot different than telling a golfer to get better/increasing talent. Dealing is a customer service job in which (per some dealers itt) dealers sometimes "rest" and "slow down" in higher stakes games because they don't feel they are treated well enough or compensated well enough. And I truly believe some don't realize that the customer wants are much different at higher stakes than lower stakes.

Most all dealers push a pot before grabbing the winning hand. Sometimes they don't though. You let it go as a player if you know what's up... Just like when I'm playing hu I don't post the sb on the button if I have a fast dealer. I look at my cards and then either put the total amount I want to make it out or I muck my hand and toss my opponent the sb amount. That is prob technically against the rules, but all the dealers who know what's up have no issue with because they know I'm good for the sb amount (obv) and they know I'm speeding up the game--> more money for them... The dealers who don't know what's up will ask both players for their blinds prior to dealing every hand.

1. Thats why one of the things listed is speak to management about it. However, there is nothing wrong with attempting to fix a problem as it is happening. I have pushed at WSOP before and the table would not stop talking about how the previous dealer just wouldnt shut-up, but did they ever tell him, or the floor - no. This, however, is not a perfect example because the WSOP is a different beast and little dealer monitoring occurs at any high level, there are just too many of them. It is also a place where they have to accept a large number of mediocre dealers because its a hard sell now to get good dealers to leave their jobs for 2 months, because there are a lot of decent places to work all across the country.

2. Just trying to give examples of EBS towards a dealer. Personally, I could care less if there is any EBS between players, as long as it isnt directed at me. Not really sure what other examples there are.

3. I agree, but the bad customers should be removed from the table, you dont want this to happen so you leave the dealer no choice but to 'defend' themselves.

4. The talent pool IS the issue. Otherwise every card room would have the fastest dealers who all took pride in their work and understood how to read a table. If you dont see this, then you may just not realize how many rooms are actually out there. And with this, the better dealers know they can choose shifts and request to not work certain tables (at times) because they know they can go somewhere else pretty easily.

At first the issue was unfair compensation. Then it was poor job satisfaction. Now it's a small talent pool?

I think the issue is management.

I don't slow down or rest during specific downs. I know dealers who say they slow down when not getting tipped and I know some dealers who say they like tournaments because with the pooled tips they don't care....

But I deal at my speed.... sometimes I may have a little more than other times but I still can't really deal faster even when I want to. I am an average speed dealer I know some dealers who can really fly ... but I can't. But to be honest with you I think I deal faster than the pace of most games. So even if i deal faster ... all your tanking, and tI met wasting (you know ...the time you spend looking somewhere else thinking about something else).

As for chat. HS or LS doesn't matter to me I'm not someone who likes to chat. If pressed by a player I may have to do it but I am don't like to chat so it's rare to hear me other than calling the game. But do you really have dealers chatting to themselves in your HS game. If they are chatting with players who are chatting back ..... might they be providing customer service to those players. Maybe if you engaged those players chatting with the dealer the dealer would shut up? I get that there are dealers who like to talk but if the players don't like it and they don't talk back wouldn't that shut those dealers down?

I wonder how many rooms actually give regular performance reviews to dealers? I agree with DGAF about management creating and enforcing a standard however when it comes to ability there is going to be a spectrum.

At maximum effort and focus I may be able to get out about 25 hands. Joe can get out 40. This has nothing to do with our level of professionalism or focus, that is our ability. Can it be increased over time? Sure, however Joe will always be faster than me.

I still think the best solution is a way to implement a good/better/best or even a good/better business model where you get the best dealers in front of the "best" customers. I only quoted best because I know it is up for debate however in the context of this discussion it would be the high stakes players.

Also ironically I think LucidDreams's posts are a good indication of why these games are tougher to deal. LD I am not criticizing your actions at all it just shows the difference between high stakes and low stakes. No one is saying much to that dealer if it was an $80 1/2 pot.

This is a terrible assumption. At no point did he say he didn't do his best work just because he didn't like dealing to a particular player.

Doing your job faster does not equate to doing your job better. Speed and efficiency are not the same. Some of the fastest dealers where I work are also some of the sloppiest dealers. They rush the game in an effort to deal more hands and to receive more tips. They upset many of the professional players with their fast, sloppy dealing, but they'll continue to do deal quickly because in the end, their conclusions are accurate. Even if the handful of professionals do stop tipping them altogether, they'll more than make up for the lost revenue simply by dealing 30 or 40 extra hands per shift.

Whenever I go to "the big game" I'm often rushed by the players and urged to go more quickly. I don't let them speed me up though, because my job is to deal an accurate, fair game. And I know that I'm not one of the slower dealers either... I just don't rush. Not too long ago I was on a PLO table with an all-in situation between two players. The pot was somewhere in the neighborhood of $20K. They elected to run it twice (2 turns, 2 rivers). Both players tabled their hands, and immediately the table captain (who wasn't in the hand) tried to rush me. "Chop it. He has 2 pairs on top, and [the other guy] has a straight on the bottom." The two players in the hand went as far as to pull their post-flop bets back, agreeing that it was a chopped pot. But I took the extra second to read the board and the hands and I stopped them. "No, there's a runner-runner flush on the bottom. It's a scooped pot."

I'm not suggesting that every time a dealer deals slowly it's because he's trying to do his job more accurately. Sometimes he's purposely slowing down the game to tilt the players or to let off steam. Sometimes he just doesn't care about doing his job at that particular moment. And I get it if you have a problem with that. But if you all (in this thread) think that you're doing anything other than letting off steam yourselves by posting about it here on 2p2, you're kidding yourselves.

Carry on.

My take is that LD was really upset by the "hey, this is just a game" type response by the dealer.

And if I get that kind of response from a dealer when he has made a careless mistake, I am going to give him grief, be the pot $8000, $80, or $18.

It had nothing to do with whether is was his 'best work' or not. He said he does not like dealing to his best paying customer. So, yeah, my assumption appears accurate.

Your assumption is assine he is a good tipper but that does make up for having to put up with his ****. Remember I can go through a whole down taking crap from him and not push him a pot, or push him a couple small pots. If everyone tipped as well as he does I would do pretty well but any one player doesn't make a big difference unless they are throwing around ridiculous money.

Do you think that being the best paying customer is all it takes to like dealing with someone - that enough money thrown around makes everything OK?

He actually answered that question already. He said there are some customers that are nice to be around, others that aren't, some that tip well, some that don't, and that in the end he will take the customers that tip the best.

Dont confuse my posts with others, some of the things said I dont agree with.

Unfair compensation - only said what it would take to run a game where rules are broken and EBS can run wild (which is also against the rules). I did also say that getting the best from your good dealers is free of charge, as long as the customer obeys the rules and policies set forth by the company. Getting a good dealer - to your expectations - to perform at their best will be tough when the environment they have to work in is shaky.

Poor job satisfaction is a management issue when they refuse to enforce a quality workplace - i.e. not kicking out repeat EBS offenders. Which is something you do not want, so you are forcing the issue. Again, IMO (and a lot of dealers here) its not something that can be fixed by just tipping better. The EBS needs to be minimal, and not recurring, if you can not follow a business's policy, then you need to take your business elsewhere...not sure there are many businesses that wouldnt agree with this.

The fact that bad dealers exist is mostly a talent pool issue. You cant just fire every sub-par dealer willy-nilly and keep only the best of the best, you wouldnt have enough employees to deal the games. Its not like there are a whole lot of unemployed good dealers out there looking for work, in fact I would venture to say that all good dealers that exist have jobs already.

As a floor I have to deal with this everyday. We have some dealers that are not that great, but our hands are tied because there are no good dealers to hire. As stated above, you can tell them over and over that they have to get better but it falls on deaf ears for some (not all - some will listen and get more training from our management and get better). All I can do is manage which shifts they work and what games...so mostly they get put into tourneys. To me though, they are not that bad, maybe a little slower, maybe a little talky, but not a lot of floor call issues. However, I will not hire any bad dealers (all of the ones we have were hired before I got into management) just to have a body in the box. In fact I have taken it upon myself to train a few people I think can be really special, free of charge, because there are no dealer schools even remotely close to us that are worth a damn (all the Michigan casinos have there own in=house training, and most use pit dealers to deal poker (I operate in a stand alone room)).

I do blame the schools (and casinos) as well for creating a bad talent pool. You will see in this site many posts about how the schools do not do enough to train good dealers, and the stand alone rooms typically can not afford to have their own training center. This can not really fall on the poker room management because they have tied hands as well because the casinos do nothing to offer them better options. You will also see a lot of bad dealers in all games at the casinos as well. To further, the industry itself has some blame because its not like there are companies out there advertising that being a dealer can be a good life of work, or reaching out to universities and colleges to add programs (imagine how much better of a poker world there would be if colleges offered degrees in dealing - outside of Nevada). Its a plane and simple fact that there are very few (to none) educational institutions that favor producing good quality dealers, and again - the stand alone rooms can not profit enough to create their own programs. This is a problem that is growing, and there are enough rooms out there to support at least a few top-notch schools spread across the country, but it hasnt happened yet

If you want to blame upper management and owners, then perhaps I will be on board, but in most scenarios the actual poker room management can do little to help the problem of the existence of what you would call a less than average dealer. To get the best of the best, you need to not be part of the worst customer base (or at least want the worst kicked out and do something proactive to stop them from being the worst customers and not just think you can extra-tip to compensate for them, because as mentioned a 100 times, its not worth it).

Disclaimer - I am in NO WAY saying that HS players are the worst customer base. I am only talking about players (at any level) that exert a high level of EBS (which you are saying are the HS players at where you play). In our room, there is no 'worst customer base' because anyone with high levels of EBS find the door rather quickly. The amount of regs that wouldnt come back if we allowed the EBS players to play (or the amount of good dealers that would quit and work elsewhere) far outweighs what the EBS players would bring to the company on their own, at least where I work.

Lots of interesting issues here ... From the small room side of things ..

1) Talent pool ... Ok, please find me a group of folks that want to work a part-time inconsistent schedule at/near minimum wage except for when their time comes up to work the cash games. Where do these folks go to learn to deal? Cash dealers can make some pretty good tips in our area, but to think that there wont be turn-over in the staff would be short-sighted. I cashed out a 2/5 dealer the other night for $85 ... of course he spent the next hour making $6.00 sitting at the other emptly table.

2) Any Floor/manager in pretty much any industry needs to find out what makes each employee tick. Is it doing their job well/learning? Is is money only? Is it minimal time in-time out each **** to 'get it over with'? Some workers can be corrected in front of the players and others need to be talked to after a down/shift.

3) I think players respect effort more than speed. If they see a dealer who is really trying to do things correctly and shows signs of potential improvement then I think those dealers will do better in the long run. I'm not suggesting dealers cater to players, but a consistent effort will get more respect than speed with an attitude IMO.

If upper management isn't supporting the floor in an effort to keep the room up to par then the Floor's job will be really tough since they probably aren't involved with the hiring process (or at least limited). GL

Even for fast food, untrainable = unemployable. I really hope the second part isn't serious. Dealing requires some physical dexterity, some customer service training/ability/sensitivity, a fair bit of attention and effort and 4th grade math skills, the latter sadly often lacking.

Tipping "customs" are actually a bargain between labor and capital. Owners have variable and uncertain demand for labor; tipping allows them to offload some of the risk of the business. And it's sort of a freeroll for the tipped employee: restauranteurs get the bottom line, often red, servers get a piece of the top line, always green. (Nefarious management sometimes tries to change this deal but tips are pretty heavily protected by labor law and courts. WSOP seems to have pulled it off though.)