{"id":21,"date":"2009-08-25T09:06:47","date_gmt":"2009-08-25T03:06:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/prhconsulting.com\/blog\/?p=21"},"modified":"2009-08-25T09:06:47","modified_gmt":"2009-08-25T03:06:47","slug":"too-much-automation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/prhconsulting.com\/blog\/2009\/08\/25\/too-much-automation\/","title":{"rendered":"Too Much Automation"},"content":{"rendered":"
Originally posted on March 28th, 2007<\/span> by Pete<\/div>\n
\n

There was an article in Wall Street Journal recently about schools overusing automated phone message systems, resulting in some families getting up to five calls in the same night and some with no real information (e.g., \u201cyour child is a pleasure to have in class\u201d)!! The desire to communicate but the ease of doing it en masse and automatically.<\/p>\n

Even worse than automated calling out\u00a0systems is the over-reliance on \u201cknowledge bases\u201d and voice recognition\u00a0for incoming\u00a0technical help call centers. There is nothing more futile than trying to get a quick answer to a system technical (usually computer-related) question. It will work like this:<\/p>\n

1. Waste a bunch of time trying to find your problem in the \u201cknowledge base\u201d of pre-built questions and answers. It is great if they have your question but, if not, you better get comfortable.<\/p>\n

2. Waste more time going on a user forum. These have a worse case of the same problem as the knowledge bases\u2013the information is not organized so you have to use a random search and\/or browsing strategy which will likely yeild\u00a0either no results or the teasing promise of results just around the corner of the next click.<\/p>\n

3. Waste more time trying to find a phone number to call an actual person. Once you find the number, you will not get a person who can answer on the first call.<\/p>\n

You could always email for help on\u00a0a non-urgent problem. The likely outcome will be an instant reply telling you to check the knowledge base!! (and probably a warning not to reply to that address\u2026and probably a message asking you to take a survey to report how satisfied you were with how they handled your case).<\/p>\n

The only thing worse is calling cellular directory assistance. Technology is great but, when you want an answer quickly, technology really can\u2019t match the satisfaction of asking someone who knows. You can clarify, you can discuss other similar situations\u2026in short, you can actually learn how something works so you can do it yourself next time. Using automation for basic, easily answered questions or for triage is fine but have a person who can help when you need it.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Originally posted on March 28th, 2007 by Pete There was an article in Wall Street Journal recently about schools overusing automated phone message systems, resulting in some families getting up to five calls in the same night and some with no real information (e.g., \u201cyour child is a pleasure to have in class\u201d)!! The desire […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"_s2mail":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7FCNy-l","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/prhconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/prhconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/prhconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prhconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prhconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/prhconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23,"href":"https:\/\/prhconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21\/revisions\/23"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/prhconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prhconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/prhconsulting.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}