"The Mute Button" - or - "Too Much Personality for Hollywood"Many, many times, as a consumer, I have answered a telemarketing call and had to ask, "Are you still there?" when the sound on the phone seemed to go dead. I never knew why that sound was happening. And every time, the person would come back on and say cheerfully, "Oh yes, I'm here! I'm just checking on that for you," and I would say, equally cheerfully, "Oh no problem! The phone just suddenly sounded odd, so I wanted to be sure I still had you." I had no idea it was The Mute Button. I believe I will be writing an entire play around The Mute Button. In fact, maybe I'll use that as the title! In fact, I have just had an unintentional training in the MOST hilarious use of The Mute Button EVER! One of my friends at the store - we'll call him Jimmy - is absolutely hilarious. At least two times a day I'll hear him say, loudly and with incredible character, "Hello! My name is Jimmy! What's your name?" (It's like he's daring the caller to call him on his bullshit. They never do.) It always makes me smile because I always think of Mister Rogers when he does that overly cheery voice. That sound also throws me back to my childhood when I watched The Mickey Mouse Club where Annette Funicello and Co. would come out of the fake doors saying their names. "Hi! I'm Annette!" Those crazy fucking doors. I remember thinking they were the coolest things ever! Anyway, at the call center I don't sit right next to my friend - though he is just one pod over - so I did not know until tonight that the reason my other friend (who sits right next to him) is always laughing is that Jimmy is constantly running a stream of commentary by toggling the mute button. But tonight I stayed a few minutes later and Oh. My. God. FUNNY! Like this... Jimmy to Customer: Yeah. I gotcha. [As in: I understand.] MUTE ON Jimmy to Lori: It's incredible. She's looking for this dress and I know it's not there, but I'm going to have to find out how to get her to take something else, and you can just tell she's focused on this dress and... MUTE OFF Jimmy to Customer: Yeah. I know... MUTE ON Jimmy to Self: ...that you're not gonna have that dress no matter what you do, so just give up! Jimmy to Lori: See, there's always something, some flaw that just doesn't get this to be a sale. Always... So many bad days of this kind of call in a row! MUTE OFF Jimmy to Customer: Oh, you saw it in the store for...what was that? OH! It was a "Last Act" [a.k.a. closeout] dress? [Throws a look at Lori.] MUTE ON Jimmy to Lori: See? Last Act. [Looks up the in-store price - dress price drops from $149 down to $43.62] Never gonna find it, and she'll never buy anything else. People are just fixated! MUTE OFF Jimmy to Customer: How about this other dress? [Gives her the number to look up.] Oh, I see. So you want to have that other $149 dress for $50 - MUTE ON Jimmy to Unhearing Customer, in incredibly conversational tone as if he is continuing to speak to the customer: - which is incredibly fucking unrealistic and is never gonna happen. This is funny to me. Of course, I'm also near to burnt out on this crazy gig and its insanely demanding schedule and the energy it takes to deal with all of these nutty people on the phone. You know, most of the people here are characters. You have to be a character to do this for more than a month, you really do. Earlier this week the higher-ups had some kind of "game" they were wanting us to play, where if we saw our bosses, we should tell them something we admired about them, and they should tell us something too. Okay, no problem. I stop my boss and tell him I appreciate him for always having my back. He tells me something way better. He tells me a whole bunch of things he appreciates about me and my work, including The Best Thing Ever: that he appreciates that I have too much personality for Hollywood - that I'm here to be this kind of crazy and keep him entertained. I love that! Makes me feel way better about failing to make it to Hollywood and be A Recognized Actor, too. And so it's today that I realize that that surfeit of personality in all of us is the reason the Mute button was created. Because we really can't express ourselves on these phones without it. And we do have to mute ourselves on the calls for more than just the customers - we are being listened to constantly. Big Brother is listening to every call. And we are absolutely losing our minds, every single day, just a little bit more every minute. If we don't look at the phone as I did at least twice today and tell the muted phone, "You are a piece of shit/crazy/stupid/moron", we will be doing drugs or keeping whiskey bottles in the drawers in no time! So, one of the things they don't train us in is one of the most important: the digital tap dancing required to put the Mute button on when it should be on and off when it should be off! And God help us all if we get it backwards. Let us pray... ©2019 Lori Kirstein
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AuthorWorking in Sales at a Call Center for one of the biggest stores in the country should come with hazard pay. Archives
December 2019
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