Numbers 2

Numbers 1

Part of the responsibilities of being a trainer apprentice was to mentor someone who was getting numerous dissatisfaction surveys from the callers.  It took a few days before our schedules coincided, but once they matched up, I grabbed the chance to listen in to his call.

How I wished I didn't.

It was painful to listen how he was fast losing control.  The caller was getting more and more irate. At one point, the control freak in me wanted to take over to wrap everything up.  "But it was not my call", I reminded myself while clenching my fingers.  Still, I felt I had to do something.  I started writing down instructions on a piece of paper the steps he could take; how to check what was wrong with the caller's device.

What could have taken 15-20 minutes max took a little over an hour.

I went back to my station with a splitting headache.

"So how did it go?" Immediate Boss asked me as I sat down and brought my palms to my forehead.

"Don't ask. My head hurts."

"So I take it didn't go well."

"No, not at all." I continued rubbing my forehead, hoping to make the throbbing go away. "I could understand how he could have passed the technical training.  He seemed to have an idea on how to go about.  But how could he have gotten pass the initial interview, much less the communication skills training?"

"You'll be surprised.  If you ask me, it's a flawed system.  They need a certain number to pass. It's part of a trainers' metrics."

I rolled my eyes. "Sure, and we end up being flooded with dissatisfaction surveys."

Immediate Boss nonchalantly shrugged his shoulders while I plugged in my headset, ready to face the grind once more.

Numbers 3