Category Archives: Business

Got Human?

Posted on by

One of our HP printers is broken, and I’ve wasted several hours the past few weeks trying to arrange to get it fixed. Waiting on hold and wading through phone trees, and at the end of it all, the promised support technician never calls to arrange a visit, and the contact number I have just sends me back into the morass of “please listen carefully as our options have recently changed” lies that never led me to a live person. (and never mind the emails, invariably from noreply@whatever or some person who responded with “that’s not my department” and subsequently ignored me)

Customer support cheat “codes” that help bypass the phone tree and let you talk to a human. It used to be that pressing “0” would do it, but many systems have changed that. With these cheat codes, you talk to a live body, your stats are maxed out and you get 10,000 gold.

I can’t vouch for all of them, but the one I was interested in got me to “Pete” (in India, from the sound of it) who transferred me to a person in the right department. While the issue was not yet fully resolved at this point, I felt that my time was being wasted in a much more efficient manner. I did get a repair tech to call, and he was fixing the printer within three hours.

I particularly liked this entry in the list:

SUNOCO Press 00000; mumble when prompted for an account number.

The sad reality is that most big companies don’t really want to talk to you if it doesn’t involve the sale of their product. Seth Godin sums it up nicely

The only reason to answer the phone when a customer calls is to make the customer happy.

If you’re not doing this or you are unable to do this, do not answer the phone. There is no middle ground on this discussion. There are no half measures. Saving 50 cents a call with a complicated phone tree is a false savings. Think of all the money you’ll save if you just stop answering altogether. Think of all the money you’ll make if you just make people happy.

Your choice.

H/T to Jay for making me aware such lists exist

We Lost … to Mathematicians?

Posted on by

Doing the Math to Find the Good Jobs

The study, to be released Tuesday from CareerCast.com, a new job site, evaluates 200 professions to determine the best and worst according to five criteria inherent to every job: environment, income, employment outlook, physical demands and stress.
[…]
According to the study, mathematicians fared best in part because they typically work in favorable conditions — indoors and in places free of toxic fumes or noise — unlike those toward the bottom of the list like sewage-plant operator, painter and bricklayer. They also aren’t expected to do any heavy lifting, crawling or crouching — attributes associated with occupations such as firefighter, auto mechanic and plumber.

Physicist ranks 13th, presumably because we experimentalists get to play with dangerous things, which I consider a perq. At least we beat out Astronomer; I suppose that’s because they have to work nights.

Cabbage Crates Coming Over the Briny

Posted on by

Who has the worst jargon?

I was recently asked to fill out a questionnaire to evaluate how my place of work was doing in terms of some business metrics. It was hell. Two groups that love their jargon and acronyms, the government and business. I thought that it could have been worse, because science could have been involved, too, so I wonder: who does the worst job with their jargon? I’m biased, but I think in general, science is not the worst offender — in the defense of myself and colleagues, it’s at least expected practice that you define any terms you’ve made up before you use them elsewhere in your presentation. In business and government/military (at least in my anecdotal experience), not so much. I’ve heard the stories (and seen once or twice for myself) of instances where someone will talk about FLURG at length, and then finally someone asks what FLURG stands for, because it turns out that nobody knew.

Unnecessary jargon obfuscates, er, hides meaning, because you focus on some buzzword without knowing what it means. So how does one distinguish between necessary and unnecessary jargon? In order to justify its use, the jargon has to give some benefit. The most obvious is shortening a long term to save time. To take some examples from atomic physics, Coherent Anti-Stokes Raman Spectroscopy is CARS, a Magneto-Optic Trap is a MOT. I consider these to be reasonable jargon, even though you may not know what Raman Spectroscopy is (it’s not the study of inexpensive noodles, that’s Ramen Spectroscopy). But no information has been lost.
Continue reading →

Moving Forward

Posted on by

Auto Bailouts and the Innovators Dilemna (sic)

By investing in an old idea, and the old guard of the U.S. auto industry, we slow the next wave of change from happening. We enable thousands of people to believe their old ways and skills are still viable, instead of motivating them to seek out new skills, products, or roles that have a chance at thriving in the decade and the next.

When you’ve been successful with an idea for years, an idea you’ve put your life into, its hard to recognize it’s time to pull the plug. Odds are high you’ll need someone else to pull the plug for you.

Related: giving retention bonuses to executives at the banks and other institutions the taxpayers are bailing out. Why? Because you’re worried you might have to hire a replacement who’s incompetent?

Just When You Think You've Gotten Over It

Posted on by

The era that defined Wall Street is finally, officially over. Michael Lewis, who chronicled its excess in Liar’s Poker, returns to his old haunt to figure out what went wrong.

The End

I know it’s been covered to death, but I found this scary and sickening, and yet couldn’t stop reading. Banks making loans they knew would fail, but apparently under the assumption that the value of the assets would continue to rise, so they’d come out ahead. Nobody really knew what they were doing.

Gettin' Wired: Your Civic Duty

Posted on by

Voting-day giveaways. Krispy Kreme giving away free donuts. Ben & Jerry’s giving away free ice cream (between 5 and 8 p.m.) and Starbucks giving out free coffee. Ostensibly to those sporting “I voted” stickers.

However …

Handy said there is a federal statute that prohibits any reward for voting.
Starbucks’ good deed can be perceived as paying someone to vote, and that’s illegal, Handy said.
“The way it is written, it expressly prohibits giving any kind of gift,” Handy said.
Handy said the intent of the statute is aimed at special interest groups trying to influence who and how people vote.
To fix the situation, Starbucks had agreed to give a tall cup of coffee to anyone who asks on Election Day.

But how is a Starbucks to know that you’ve already gotten a free coffee at another location? Or a donut, or ice cream? Shoot, a feller could have a pretty good time in Vegas with all that stuff! Just stay below the lethal dose.

JW, Please Purchase a Clue

Posted on by

Because you are a valued customer and your opinion is important to us, we would like to periodically ask you to provide feedback regarding your experience with our hotels. The feedback we collect from our customers is used to make improvements to our hotels and processes so we can better serve you.

However, our records indicate that you have not given us permission to send customer survey invitations to you at this email address. If you would like the opportunity to provide occasional feedback, please give us permission to contact you (https://www.blahblahblah) at this email address to complete future surveys. This permission is for research purposes only and does not give us permission to send you any marketing or promotional information.

Thank you in advance for your feedback and for spending your time away from home at Marriott.

Sincerely,

J.W. Marriott, Jr.
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer
Marriott International, Inc.

Um, no? Not in a house, not with a mouse?

Or, to use a phrase I learned in the navy: Not only no, but @%#$ no!

The point of “please don’t use my email to contact me” was “don’t contact me.”