When deal­ing with eti­quette, I am con­stantly point­ing out people’s short­com­ings and turn­ing those into learn­ing sit­u­a­tions. Finally, I have the oppor­tu­nity to point out some­thing that some­one has done right.

Justin Tim­ber­lake is a man of his word and attended Saturday’s Marine Corps ball with Cpl. Kelsey De San­tis. Back in July, Cpl. De San­tis posted a YouTube video ask­ing him to escort her to the the ball and he accepted. Sat­ur­day he proved he was a man of his word by escort­ing her to the ball.

Reports are that he had a good time, was a nor­mal per­son and posed for pic­tures with other guests. While many might con­sider this a pub­lic­ity stunt, Tim­ber­lake was moved by the event and posted a let­ter about his evening on his website.

Tim­ber­lake said, “To all of you that serve every day for us… Ensur­ing our free­dom, I say: My deep­est grat­i­tude to you. I’ve met so many of my heroes… From Michael Jor­dan to Michael Jack­son. And, noth­ing makes me feel more honor and pride than when I get to meet one of you. Last night changed my life and I will never for­get it.”

We can all learn from this and should always give our mil­i­tary men and women the respect and honor they deserve. Thank you for all that you do.

Just in case you want to link to the full letter:

Justin Timberlake’s night at the Marine Corps ball

When most peo­ple think about eti­quette, they think about table man­ners and which fork to use while eat­ing their salad. Eti­quette is also a pop­u­lar topic in the busi­ness world. Hir­ing man­agers judge their prospec­tive employ­ees to see their knowl­edge of eti­quette and man­agers have their employ­ees take eti­quette train­ing to help improve their skills in hopes it will increase sales.

Most peo­ple do not real­ize that eti­quette is also a part of sports. Webster’s defines sports­man­ship as con­duct becom­ing to one par­tic­i­pat­ing in a sport. In other words, sports­man­ship is a form of eti­quette and as such your con­duct should be reflec­tive of you and the orga­ni­za­tion you are representing.

Recently, two foot­ball coaches almost were involved in an alter­ca­tion after their game. At the end of a foot­ball game, it is cus­tom­ary for the oppos­ing coaches to shake hands. Some­times they share a few words, wish the other luck and then go on with their busi­ness, but, at a min­i­mum, they shake hands. At the end of this game, the los­ing coach took offense at the win­ning coach’s exu­ber­ance dur­ing their hand­shake. The win­ning coach shook the loser’s hand and gave him a slap on the back. Already upset with los­ing the game, the los­ing coach men­tally lost it after this hand­shake and began chas­ing the win­ning coach down. Thank­fully, cooler heads pre­vailed and kept the two separated.

Per­cep­tion played a major role in this eti­quette break­down. Your actions are per­ceived by oth­ers and it is impor­tant for your intent to be per­ceived cor­rectly. I’m sure the win­ning coach had no intent to embar­rass the other coach, how­ever, this is how it was per­ceived by the los­ing coach and it almost resulted in a fight. Every­body loves to win, but it is impor­tant to win with dig­nity and con­duct your­self in a man­ner that is respect­ful to the loser and is pos­i­tively rep­re­sen­ta­tive of your organization.

Hey, Ange­lenos. Have you ever dreamed about din­ing at Spago? How about sam­pling the sushi at Nobu? Fight­ing the paparazzi as you pre­pare to eat at BOA Steak­house in West Hol­ly­wood? Now is your chance as dineLA restau­rant week has returned. Hun­dreds of local restau­rants are offer­ing spe­cially priced three course meals for lunch or din­ner, so why not go out and sup­port your local restau­rants and taste some of the food that makes Los Ange­les one of the great­est places to eat in the world.  Make your reser­va­tions today.

While you’re out, don’t for­get to bring your man­ners with you. Din­ing eti­quette is an often for­got­ten con­cept as peo­ple are more con­cerned with the instant grat­i­fi­ca­tion that comes from fill­ing their hun­gry stom­achs. How­ever, per­cep­tion doesn’t stop at the din­ing table. In fact, many com­pa­nies test din­ing eti­quette as one of the last steps in the inter­view process. By using proper din­ing eti­quette, you will look more pro­fes­sional and attain a self con­fi­dence that will ben­e­fit you in work and social set­tings and set you apart from the crowd.

Jason Shelowitz, a 31 year old graphic designer from New York City, is fed up. He’s reached his boil­ing point and he’s doing some­thing about it.

Shelowitz started the Met­ro­pol­i­tan Eti­quette Author­ity — his one man cam­paign to enforce eti­quette in New York City. In an effort to gen­tly remind New York­ers of civil­ity and man­ners, Shelowitz has posted 40 imi­ta­tion street signs through­out the city with help­ful reminders like “Pull up your pants”, “Don’t flick your butts on the ground” and “Clean up after your horse.”

Shelowitz was inspired to do this after his dog stepped on a lit cig­a­rette while they were out­walk­ing. He feels “it’s a mat­ter of say­ing what everyone’s thinking.”

Last year, Shelowitz tar­geted sub­way rid­ers with a poster cam­paign that pointed out dis­gust­ing sub­way behav­iors. Now he’s taken his work above ground.