"I feel like I know you."You do, because I connect with you emotionally. Aaaaand...you don't, because you don't. I laugh with you because I can and because that is absolutely my response to the absurdity and beauty and unending challenge of communicating with people I "meet" on the phone. I also laugh because it gets you to chill out. It clues you in to the reassuring fact that you're not talking to a machine. It gives you the confident feeling that I don't hate my job and therefore you. Apparently, laughter is my Secret Weapon. A man named Alan has been on my mind in the last couple of months. He was the Call Center Manager for the Playhouse In the Park Subscriptions Call Center (if you can call one room a Call Center...but I digress). I wandered in there a few years ago and made outbound calls to sell subscriptions. When Alan appeared on the scene, I had one season under my belt and I was loaded for bear, phone-wise. Halfway through the season, Alan mused, "I think the reason people are responding to you is your laugh. I'm not sure, but I'm thinking that's what it is..." He was trying to work out what my "secret" was so that, possibly (?), he could teach others to do it. And now here I am, working for one of the country's biggest retailers, on the phones and laughing, and I suddenly realize that he's right! "It's a thing"! A woman called me about 2 weeks ago and purchased $500 worth of clothing. We spoke for 90 minutes and we laughed and I did my thing of connecting and selling. The next day, at her request, I called her back and she purchased $1,000 worth of clothing. She said she had told her husband the night before that she felt like she knew me. That pulled me up short a little. People do get attached easily, especially if they're not accustomed to being connected with. By the end of the call, it was close to 11:00PM. I was working a 4:30-12PM shift, and she and I had spoken for 3 or 4 HOURS. We were fine until the third hour. But when we tried to check her out, the system had a hiccup and then another hiccup, and it became a massive problem in terms of time. I ended up calling her back at 11:30 at night in order to finally place the order. But that wasn't what caused the problem. I actually showed a little bit of frustration during our fourth hour. She exhibited no sensitivity to the time this was all taking, and was going to squeeze every little bit of precision out of this order even though I had already had to redo the order once from memory and research (thank you so much, system). I didn't go off on her, and it was a matter of tone of voice which I did get back in check, but she was clearly not amused. I tried to make it all better by sending her a 25% off coupon, but it didn't help. When I came back to work after my weekend, I learned she had turned to someone else to place an order. She was mad at me. Clearly. And that was fascinating. "I feel like I know you" means you think you know what to expect. And when that doesn't happen, you get to be angry. But you don't know me. And what I know is that it is my responsibility to make it clear to people like that - though I won't be on the phones anymore (at least, not to my knowledge) - that it is "my pleasure" to help them, but that this is an exchange that I am happy to engage in, and not an engagement party. Call Center Sales is a thing that is so misunderstood as to be NOT understood. So, as I start into my new job, I put more items on my list of things to teach to others about how to be even better at their jobs. But I have something else to do first. I have to reveal what this job really is, and how skilled it actually is. And I have to be patient with other people not knowing... I like to work top/down, bottom/up, and all around the town, when it comes to making things better at any company for whom I work. Now I've been put in a leadership position, and I'm making lists of (1) what can be better done by the people "at the bottom" - with assistance from people at the top to help them get better; and (2) what can be done better at the top (a.k.a. organizationally) to make things better for every single aspect of the store...at least, those aspects that I can see so far.
This is like being a combination of Sherlock Holmes and Bernie Sanders! Cool! This is the kind of stuff that makes me happy! Some people call it problem-solving, some call it change management, and I call it Big Fun. Yes, yes, I know. I'm odd. I'm also realizing I should have been in Change Management a loooooong time ago. So, tomorrow I head into a new position at the store, and I get to learn and grow some more and put my energies into helping others in the Call Center I've been working in for 5 months. And I get to connect with people who will be able to say that they really do know me.
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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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