Change behaviours not just the tools

ISPs frustrate me. First, the IT support process requires you to quote usernames and passwords (which are a non-configurable jumble of letters and numbers) in every email you send to them. Why would I want to contact Fasthosts if they weren't my service provider? I think 99.9999% of us have better things to do than get assistance from another ISP - which is bound to be technically flawed anyway.

Second, several of us in Budd are now using Blackberry's and judging by the numbers of people sending email on the train this morning, so is half the business world. So why does Fasthost insist on not supporting them? My support question this morning asked why they didn't, when they would and should I take my business elsewhere? The response was pilot but completely missed the point. "We have no plans to support Blackberry but contact us if you need anything else". No I don't need anything else, I want Blackberry support!!!

This sensitivity to the situation is often missing from the customer experience process. How often do you end up being told "sorry we can't do that here, you'll have to call another number" or similar, and then be asked "but is there anything else I can help you with today?", is a ludicrous and blindingly stupid approach to the customer experience.

Awareness of and sensitivity towards the customer frustrations have been squeezed out of many call centres by performance management approaches. We see this more and more as we implement WOCAS and train the front line. We spend more time on the awareness part than we do on using the tools and need to support for them for some time afterwards to embed the habit of spotting the frustrations (and logging them).

As ever, changing behaviours is far more critical than just changing the process or tools.