Saturday, November 23, 2013

Hi. How can I [not] help?

via
Just when I was about to write this post and rant about an average Customer Service experience, I found the image above, and it sums it up.

I'm sure you have been there at least one (or a dozen) times in your life. You desperatly need help with whatever issue you have, dialing a 1-800 number hoping to get a human on the other end of the cord, going into details, pouring your heart out, even addressing them by their name. And all you get is "I understand, I'm sorry, but I cannot help".

The options they give you are in a range of something a 5 year old could figure without having to call them or the answer that is listed on the FAQ page. Basically, not the one you were hoping to get. I don't know about the rest of people's reactions, but CS expeiences like that make me want to cry, ask them "Why don't you love me?" and yell out "Don't be a robot" all at the same time.

That is not to say that some Customer Service reps have been nice and/or helpful to me on a number of occasions, but once bad experience like that erases all the good memories of them from my brain.

Oh, and how much do you love the "Is there anything else I can do for you today?" standard, almost automatic, soul-less phrase at the end of the conversation?.. I find it at least insulting.

Beeeep.

Saturday, November 2, 2013

Political Correctness

politically correct
A way that we speak in America so we don't offend whining pussies.



via
The other day two hosts of a radio show mentioned how America has changed and the always present political correctness has become so dominating it's hard to communicate openly and honestly anymore. Now I myself have no idea the way America was 50 years ago, heck I'm not sure what it was like here before 2006, but it's clear to me that for the most part people DO filter their messages. Like, a lot.

One of the hardest adjustments I had to make was learning to watch my mouth and keep 1/3 of my thoughts to myself. In most cases, unless you're in your own kitchen and/or surrounded by your family, you should not say all the truth about how you feel. Just because. Being "politically correct" about anything and everything is the number one rule of successful communication.

Considering that the speaking manner in my native language is pretty direct and informal, trust me when I tell you it was quite the change for me. Just to give you a quick run-down of the cases where you have to extra careful choosing your words (if speak on the subject at all) are the ones that have to do anything with:


politics
religion
sexuality
race

and some less known/recognized:

your management
your co-workers
someone else's children
anything to do with money
psychological conditions
drugs

...

[everything else that might displease anyone for any reason]

In short, watch your words, smile a lot and better pretend to agree than express your true and honest opinion, because most don't want to hear it.