Originally published 17 August 2009. This article is retained from the tCI archive. Law, policy or practice may have changed since publication.
Seasoned customer service professionals have long realised that there are occasions when their job is just to listen!
Poor service, unrealised expectations, disappointing experiences or even bad luck sometimes push people towards the end of their tether. When this happens, they just need to get something off their chest. This is why we have Rant Lines or their electronic equivalents. The Met Office probably needed one in July! Analysis of these contributions can tell us a lot about customer or citizen perceptions. Here in rough, raw detail, you can hear the prejudices of the population – uncensored, unmoderated and unrestrained. You need an equable temperament and a wide and colourful vocabulary to run a Rant Line!
‘Tell us what you think’ may be a risky invitation if you supply a questionable product. But it is equally hazardous when public bodies seek opinions where their proposals trigger a deep-rooted sense of grievance. When one local authority last year consulted over its proposed sites for Gypsies and Travellers, many responses were deemed offensive or racist and the Council declined to publish. Clearly there is much anger in some situations. The questions are: Can it, or should it be suppressed? Or should we just seek ways to accommodate it?
When people are upset, they are rarely in the mood for rational argument and debate. It is better to listen constructively and try to understand what moves them to such sentiments.
A public meeting is usually an inappropriate forum for losing one’s cool. Ditto a Focus Group, though there may be the odd exception. A deliberative event struggles to be truly ‘deliberative’ if passions run this high, and lobbying a representative organisation to express your strongly-held views ends in disillusion as they steer towards the calmer waters of logical discourse.
Face it. An eloquent, passionate rant is best conducted on the privacy of one’s own telephone – or laptop. It is often delivered in haste and repented of at leisure; the substance is often secondary to the verbal pyrotechnics. And at the end of it? Ah ...we all feel better now!
But let’s not dismiss these gesture contributions. Clever companies can learn from having Rant Lines and listening to them. Real issues and real problems lurk behind the emotions. It is one good reason (among many) for public bodies to provide space for such views to be expressed. Establish a hotline or a web page to give callers or online users the opportunity to sound off, and encourage this to be wide-ranging. Service feedback is the obvious one. But also consultation. Rant Lines ok. OK?
Trigger points
- How does your organisation hear the unmoderated views of customers or consultees?
- Have you considered a Rant Line?
- Do you have strategies (or have trained staff) to cope with inappropriate rants at consultation events?
- Pass it on.... Although Topics are distributed to named members of the Institute, we don’t mind if you forward it to someone else in your organisation if you think it could be useful to them. It would be nice, however, if you also drew their attention to the Institute’s programme – and opportunities to work with us.
This is the 142nd Tuesday Topic; a full list of subjects covered is available for Institute members and is a valuable resource covering so many aspects of consultation and engagement