Undercover for Labor Day

Labor Day was spent doing anything but laboring for me. I'm not ashamed to admit that I vegged out the whole day watching TV.  I started out with a How I Met Your Mother marathon. I soon tired of that and moved on to a Picker Sisters marathon. I could have watched that all day but the marathon only lasted until 2pm, what kinda marathon is that?

But it's good that it did end as it forced me to channel surf until I found another marathon, the Undercover Boss marathon. I was hooked on this for the rest of the day until the Keeping Up with the Kardashians season finale!  I know, I know! I need to get a life, but c'mon...it was Labor Day! And over 100 outside, so I was perfectly fine just sitting on my couch with a bag of sunflower seeds and a diet Pepsi!

Anyway, back to Undercover Boss. I had seen promos for this show before but have to admit I wasn't thrilled about watching it. The first one I got to see was the boss in a casino in Las Vegas. Since I had recently been to Las Vegas I thought this would be interesting...and it was.

Scott Sibella, President and COO of the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, goes undercover within the walls of the second-largest hotel in the world. The MGM employees are told that he is a contestant in a reality show where two individuals are trying to win as the best employee. He goes undercover wearing a wig and glasses and tries several of the jobs at the MGM, starting out as a card dealer. It's hilarious to watch him trying to shuffle the cards the way his trainer Eddie instructs him. And Eddie wasn't hard on the eyes either! Just check him out standing to the right in this picture.

The one who really touched my heart was Donn, the 62 year old roulette dealer who is a Vietnam Veteran who promised himself after all he saw in Vietnam that he would never sweat anything ever again. His biggest issue was the cigarette smoke as smoking is allowed in the casinos and it really bothered his breathing.

There were a couple of other employees that Scott had to work with during his time undercover, but what I really loved was the end when he revealed himself to the employees as their Boss. Some were shocked and you can see them mentally playing back everything they might have said while they thought he was just a contestant in a reality show. I can only imagine what I might have said about where I work! Yikes!

Scott gets to do something special for each one of the employees personally but also finds out what types of changes they need to make overall for the good of all the employees. I thought it was a really great way to get into the trenches and see what the front line is really doing for the company. I believe that deep down employees want to take pride in their jobs and they want to be recognized for all they do. I don't know if there will be a new season of this show but if there is definitely I will watch it. For now I know that you can watch past episodes, including the MGM Grand episode HERE.