7 ms·

I know this is generally effective, which is why it's done, but personally I hate it: reflecting what I said back to me and telling me how frustrating it must b

by nkrisc 7y ago

I know this is generally effective, which is why it's done, but personally I hate it: reflecting what I said back to me and telling me how frustrating it must be. No shit, I know that. Don't make me read that, just tell me how the problem can be solved. I don't even need you to tell me you're sorry. I'm not looking for empathy or a shoulder to cry on, I'm looking for a solution and to waste as little time as possible. The worst is when you're calling support and have to listen to them talk through this BS in real time, at least in an email I can skim over it. For the cynical among us, these responses are probably aggravating. For the majority of people though, they're probably effective.

this_is_not_you 7y ago
I agree. And definitely do not call me if I contacted you via email.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- ddingus 7y ago
  Yes, respond on the channel received. I do a fair amount over SMS of all things. It is potent. They can quickly send the trouble, media, etc... I will just open a ticket for them at some point to capture things for later, but a quick response almost always works well.
michaelt 7y ago
Repeating what the customer said back to them only seems popular because the status quo in first-line support is reply with a form e-mail without having read and understood the customer's e-mail
lbotos 7y ago
You are highlighting something that we are trying to quantify on my team right now. Customers come to you either scared or savvy, or somewhere on that spectrum. You are often a savvy customer, that is being treated like you are scared. That disconnect is where your animosity comes from. Good Support will be able to quickly identify where you are on the scale, and tailor the response appropriately. Problem number two: It's hard to keep good people in support because it's difficult and often underpaid because its a cost of good sold.
- kqr 7y ago
  Cool way to view it! This is also an argument in favour of long-term business relations over short-term ones: you can skip the part where you figure out where the customer is, because you already know it. Meaning much less wasted time and more efficient support on both ends.
  - lbotos 7y ago
    That said, sometimes a savvy customer can become scared, if say, adopting a new feature. I agree that TAMs and other account managers may be able to feed data into that model, support may be the front line as it shifts (but also a TAM or another Account Exec could be too). It's still in it's early stages in use here, but it's been a huge help already intra-support for my team.
- wpietri 7y ago
  > It's hard to keep good people in support because it's difficult and often underpaid because its a cost of good sold. That's one way to look at it. Another is that it's marketing and brand-building. Yet another is that it's user research. And vital data for process improvement, product improvement, and waste reduction. In reading about Lean Manufacturing, one of the most interesting things I learned is that companies that successfully transition to it don't just change their manufacturing. They change their accounting. That's because traditional accounting has viewpoints baked into it that conflict with long-term improvement.
  - sdoering 7y ago
    I am very interested in this. especially the change in accounting and the reasoning behind this. could you point me in the right direction regarding where you read it? thanks in advance.
    - jdlshore 7y ago
      Look into cost accounting vs. lean accounting. /The Goal/ is a classic and relatively fun read. /Principles of Product Development Flow/ is also highly regarded, although neither are strictly accounting books.
duxup 7y ago
Just parroting what someone says... that's super annoying, but there is some use to something like it. I do a lot of: "Here is the problem as I understand it, X -> Y -> Z, when A, B, C. Let me know if I got that right." Then I go on into what I saw when I tried it. What repeating SHOULD be is confirming that we're all on the same page (often with new details and specifics). What it often is ... is just repeating. Sadly I found folks so generally frustrated by support that a large % of time they would be upset even when you were trying to understand. Some folks are so sensitive to repeating things back that they miss when I include new information / questions. Support sucks, customers are frustrated so they don't really participate and hurt themselves ... companies devalue support, good management avoids / leaves support, and the whole thing stinks. I chose to leave that general business unit / area despite being well paid because of such things. I actually had engineering folks at my previous job reach out to me to encourage me to apply and return because we worked together well, I enjoyed working with them, but there was no getting around that I would be on the support team and I didn't want that.
- QuercusMax 7y ago
  Yup, all too often support cases may have an X/Y Problem (see http://xyproblem.info/ http://xyproblem.info/). It's really import to clarify: 1. What they're trying to accomplish 2. The steps they're taking 3. The expected result 4. The actual result A misunderstanding of any of those points can waste huge amounts of time and cause lots of frustration.
  - duxup 7y ago
    Yeah if you can come up with a good definition of a problem, you can save serious time / $. If you don't ... hold on man it's gonna be a wild ride because really you're just guessing.
  - dmd 7y ago
    http://3e.org/xy.png http://3e.org/xy.png
  - roel_v 7y ago
    Well I've gotten allergic to the term 'XY problem' itself. All too often it's tossed around by people who think they know my problem better than I do, and then dismiss me by saying 'don't do that' or 'just do something else' (this is mostly in the context of 'community support' like Stack Overflow). It happens mostly when I distill a problem down into its most basic, abstract form, because otherwise it's too difficult to explain (I mean I can't fault people for not wanting to take 30 minutes to understand all design nuances and trade offs that were made over the last 10 years in my particular case). Then they take that abstract example as the real use case and find reasons to not answer the actual question. Then again, I'm probably in the 'cynical' category mentioned up-thread.
KineticLensman 7y ago
> personally I hate it Totally agree. To me the effect is very similar to the beginning of a typical scam telephone call where the caller starts by asking whether I'm having a good day.
wpietri 7y ago
Is it generally effective? I mean sure, this technique can be handy in person in the hands of a skilled person who actually cares. But I have to suspect most people see through the insincerity, at least on a subconscious level. I honestly am happier if somebody quickly and sincerely acknowledges my feelings and POV, as then I can be sure I got my point across. (Before moving on to solutions, of course, because eagerness to fix the problem is a major part of my feelings.) But what immediately doubles my irritation is when responses feel synthetic. It's like when an on-hold recording says, "We're sorry for the delay." Who exactly is sorry? The little bit of looped tape? The voice actor hired 7 years ago to record the script? The telephone network? Nobody. Nobody is experiencing sorrow that I'm on hold. If they were, they might work to fix the problem. Support responses generally feel the same way to me. And I'm especially looking at you here, Amazon.
Kalium 7y ago
> For the cynical among us, these responses are probably aggravating. I've been dealing with some support recently that leans heavily on the empathy. They're also proving to be useless at actually addressing my problems. This is a great combination for generating extreme frustration, particularly in a cynic like myself. I may be alone in this, but I suspect maybe not.

by nkrisc 7y ago

this_is_not_you 7y ago

I agree. And definitely do not call me if I contacted you via email.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
ddingus 7y ago
Yes, respond on the channel received. I do a fair amount over SMS of all things. It is potent. They can quickly send the trouble, media, etc... I will just open a ticket for them at some point to capture things for later, but a quick response almost always works well.

michaelt 7y ago

Repeating what the customer said back to them only seems popular because the status quo in first-line support is reply with a form e-mail without having read and understood the customer's e-mail

lbotos 7y ago

You are highlighting something that we are trying to quantify on my team right now. Customers come to you either scared or savvy, or somewhere on that spectrum. You are often a savvy customer, that is being treated like you are scared. That disconnect is where your animosity comes from. Good Support will be able to quickly identify where you are on the scale, and tailor the response appropriately. Problem number two: It's hard to keep good people in support because it's difficult and often underpaid because its a cost of good sold.

kqr 7y ago
Cool way to view it! This is also an argument in favour of long-term business relations over short-term ones: you can skip the part where you figure out where the customer is, because you already know it. Meaning much less wasted time and more efficient support on both ends.
- lbotos 7y ago
  That said, sometimes a savvy customer can become scared, if say, adopting a new feature. I agree that TAMs and other account managers may be able to feed data into that model, support may be the front line as it shifts (but also a TAM or another Account Exec could be too). It's still in it's early stages in use here, but it's been a huge help already intra-support for my team.
wpietri 7y ago
> It's hard to keep good people in support because it's difficult and often underpaid because its a cost of good sold. That's one way to look at it. Another is that it's marketing and brand-building. Yet another is that it's user research. And vital data for process improvement, product improvement, and waste reduction. In reading about Lean Manufacturing, one of the most interesting things I learned is that companies that successfully transition to it don't just change their manufacturing. They change their accounting. That's because traditional accounting has viewpoints baked into it that conflict with long-term improvement.
- sdoering 7y ago
  I am very interested in this. especially the change in accounting and the reasoning behind this. could you point me in the right direction regarding where you read it? thanks in advance.
  - jdlshore 7y ago
    Look into cost accounting vs. lean accounting. /The Goal/ is a classic and relatively fun read. /Principles of Product Development Flow/ is also highly regarded, although neither are strictly accounting books.

duxup 7y ago

Just parroting what someone says... that's super annoying, but there is some use to something like it. I do a lot of: "Here is the problem as I understand it, X -> Y -> Z, when A, B, C. Let me know if I got that right." Then I go on into what I saw when I tried it. What repeating SHOULD be is confirming that we're all on the same page (often with new details and specifics). What it often is ... is just repeating. Sadly I found folks so generally frustrated by support that a large % of time they would be upset even when you were trying to understand. Some folks are so sensitive to repeating things back that they miss when I include new information / questions. Support sucks, customers are frustrated so they don't really participate and hurt themselves ... companies devalue support, good management avoids / leaves support, and the whole thing stinks. I chose to leave that general business unit / area despite being well paid because of such things. I actually had engineering folks at my previous job reach out to me to encourage me to apply and return because we worked together well, I enjoyed working with them, but there was no getting around that I would be on the support team and I didn't want that.

QuercusMax 7y ago
Yup, all too often support cases may have an X/Y Problem (see http://xyproblem.info/ http://xyproblem.info/). It's really import to clarify: 1. What they're trying to accomplish 2. The steps they're taking 3. The expected result 4. The actual result A misunderstanding of any of those points can waste huge amounts of time and cause lots of frustration.
- duxup 7y ago
  Yeah if you can come up with a good definition of a problem, you can save serious time / $. If you don't ... hold on man it's gonna be a wild ride because really you're just guessing.
- dmd 7y ago
  http://3e.org/xy.png http://3e.org/xy.png
- roel_v 7y ago
  Well I've gotten allergic to the term 'XY problem' itself. All too often it's tossed around by people who think they know my problem better than I do, and then dismiss me by saying 'don't do that' or 'just do something else' (this is mostly in the context of 'community support' like Stack Overflow). It happens mostly when I distill a problem down into its most basic, abstract form, because otherwise it's too difficult to explain (I mean I can't fault people for not wanting to take 30 minutes to understand all design nuances and trade offs that were made over the last 10 years in my particular case). Then they take that abstract example as the real use case and find reasons to not answer the actual question. Then again, I'm probably in the 'cynical' category mentioned up-thread.

KineticLensman 7y ago

> personally I hate it Totally agree. To me the effect is very similar to the beginning of a typical scam telephone call where the caller starts by asking whether I'm having a good day.

wpietri 7y ago

Is it generally effective? I mean sure, this technique can be handy in person in the hands of a skilled person who actually cares. But I have to suspect most people see through the insincerity, at least on a subconscious level. I honestly am happier if somebody quickly and sincerely acknowledges my feelings and POV, as then I can be sure I got my point across. (Before moving on to solutions, of course, because eagerness to fix the problem is a major part of my feelings.) But what immediately doubles my irritation is when responses feel synthetic. It's like when an on-hold recording says, "We're sorry for the delay." Who exactly is sorry? The little bit of looped tape? The voice actor hired 7 years ago to record the script? The telephone network? Nobody. Nobody is experiencing sorrow that I'm on hold. If they were, they might work to fix the problem. Support responses generally feel the same way to me. And I'm especially looking at you here, Amazon.

Kalium 7y ago

> For the cynical among us, these responses are probably aggravating. I've been dealing with some support recently that leans heavily on the empathy. They're also proving to be useless at actually addressing my problems. This is a great combination for generating extreme frustration, particularly in a cynic like myself. I may be alone in this, but I suspect maybe not.