Pod People

Going into the customer service industry takes a certain type of personality to succeed. This personality is typically one that has a passion for the industry that they are going into and have a firm belief that they will be providing a great service to the public with the service they provide. It is almost a vision of that lone ranger standing on a mountain peak with a proud upturned chin, wind blowing through their hair, and a big badge stating "How may I help you?"

In my years of managing these people, It is always interesting to observe the first time a person has worked in the service industry and to determine if they will make it. A new employee will usually start with a freshness and they are enthusiastic to start working with the public to showcase the awesomeness in their great service. They have an underlined cockiness to them and will look to the more seasoned workers with contempt because they can not understand why they have lost their enthusiasm and also think to themselves that they will never be like "them". "Them"as having lost their sparkle and have no more desire to give superior customer service because they have realized that, in most cases, no matter how hard they try the customer will not reciprocate the reaction that is expected, perhaps this is as simple as a thank you. So "they" have given up and gone down the flat-line road, where they don't give bad service, but they don't go above or beyond as they once did. Little does this new sparkley energetic employee know that "they" were once like him/her and have been beaten down like a tired dog and callused by the general public's unknowingly disregard that the person they are helping is another human being. It seems like once a person wears a name-tag or stands behind a counter ready to help people that the people on the other side of the counter then believe that they have every right to treat this person with as little regard as a person as they like.

Have you ever seen the movie "The Dark Crystal"? There are these cute bubbly little Muppet Pod people who are captured by the evil grotesque Skeksis who drain the Pod people's life juices t and drink to make keep them young. The Pod people are them left in a zombie like state and become pale faced servants for the Skeksis. Now I am not saying that all customers are Skeksis, but.... it is draining to continually try to excel by helping people as best as possible and to only be let down with the same result of under-appreciation and sometimes downright cruelty. I will give examples of that in future posts.

Unfortunately these Pod people are the ones that have survived, the left over zombies that have lost their zing. Then you will hear the public state with dazzling wonderment and ever pondering question "where has the customer service gone?" It is a vicious cycle where the more people strive to give great customer service the more people come to expect that as the norm and when they don't always receive that same type of service at every place they go they will give the worker their opinion. Every time this happens a piece of the zing is chipped away until it is gone.