Self-serve hell
Would you rather do it yourself, or have someone do it for you?
Most Americans have a default response of wanting to do it themselves. And there's real value in that-- most people want to be self-reliant, and enjoy figuring out how things work. And there's freedom in the competence of being able to look out for oneself. There's also the working-person sentiment that it's a little soft to have people catering to you-- a bit snooty to have Johnson bring the car when you can darn well do it yourself. All these things mix together in the American attitude of self-service.
But I am starting to chafe against this notion when it comes to doing mundane tasks that keep business flowing: Checking myself in at the airport, buying theater tickets online, booking a campsite for 4th-of-July weekend, buying my stuff at Home Depot, doing bank transactions, signing up for classes.
Why can't I just talk to a human who will take care of it for me? I don't want to spend 2 hours a day on the Internet, filling out online forms. Nor do I want to be greeted at a store, hotel, airport, or the Post Office by a kiosk rather than a person. I feel like all of society is becoming automated, including our interactions. It feels like a waste of my time when I have to punch the buttons myself, whereas I wouldn't feel that way if I spent 2 minutes chatting with a service person during the transaction.
I was just reading an article about how your real estate agent might not be working as hard for you as they claim, and to avoid being shafted it was best to do a lot of online research, or even decide to sell your home by yourself. While I certainly agree that the Internet is democratizing information flow, I cringed at the notion of spending all the time and effort needed to properly sell a house by myself. There's a reason why we hire experts! They spent that time learning and training so that I don't have to. It's not that I couldn't do it-- I'm perfectly intelligent enough to understand how to sell a house-- but maybe I'd rather put my attention elsewhere, like on having a life.
When will fans of do-it-yourself-online realize that their time is valuable? More valuable than becoming their own glorified check-out clerk for every standard task that needs to get done in the world?
Others are starting to notice this trend. Check out this article: Service gets lost in self-serve world. [Thanks, Faz]. There are a lot of important themes that just barely get touched upon in it. For instance:
Yeah. And you can tell. People have fewer basic communication skills than they used to. I have never been fond of the phone-- it requires real-time responses without all the visual cues that you get in face-to-face interactions. But I do miss actually interacting with humans sometimes. (Or even if there are humans there, sometimes they are too spaced-out to really talk to the customers they are dealing with, but that's another issue).
This is quite important also. Senior citizens and poor people already feel alienated from regular society. And with the pace of life getting ever faster, they often can't keep up. Now we are going to remove the humans from their lives too? That will only increase the isolation. It's just sad.
As I have begun to tune into these problems with the Internet world, I have found some positive responses. I now make more of an effort to smile at people, make eye contact, and even chat a bit if it's appropriate. I practice being right where I am, not thinking about the next place I'm rushing to.
I try to see the people I meet-- like the check-out person at the grocery store-- as people, not as tools performing a function for me. Now that we have computers replacing them in some cases, it is all the more abundantly clear to me that humans are not computers. They're a lot better to deal with in many cases. (Not always! But you might be surprised how often).
These are simple things that anyone can do. I encourage you to adopt the practice of looking at people, smiling, etc. It's a healthy response to the ever-increasing mechanization of society.
And better yet-- it's something you can do all by yourself, without having anyone do it for you. :-)
Most Americans have a default response of wanting to do it themselves. And there's real value in that-- most people want to be self-reliant, and enjoy figuring out how things work. And there's freedom in the competence of being able to look out for oneself. There's also the working-person sentiment that it's a little soft to have people catering to you-- a bit snooty to have Johnson bring the car when you can darn well do it yourself. All these things mix together in the American attitude of self-service.
But I am starting to chafe against this notion when it comes to doing mundane tasks that keep business flowing: Checking myself in at the airport, buying theater tickets online, booking a campsite for 4th-of-July weekend, buying my stuff at Home Depot, doing bank transactions, signing up for classes.
Why can't I just talk to a human who will take care of it for me? I don't want to spend 2 hours a day on the Internet, filling out online forms. Nor do I want to be greeted at a store, hotel, airport, or the Post Office by a kiosk rather than a person. I feel like all of society is becoming automated, including our interactions. It feels like a waste of my time when I have to punch the buttons myself, whereas I wouldn't feel that way if I spent 2 minutes chatting with a service person during the transaction.
I was just reading an article about how your real estate agent might not be working as hard for you as they claim, and to avoid being shafted it was best to do a lot of online research, or even decide to sell your home by yourself. While I certainly agree that the Internet is democratizing information flow, I cringed at the notion of spending all the time and effort needed to properly sell a house by myself. There's a reason why we hire experts! They spent that time learning and training so that I don't have to. It's not that I couldn't do it-- I'm perfectly intelligent enough to understand how to sell a house-- but maybe I'd rather put my attention elsewhere, like on having a life.
When will fans of do-it-yourself-online realize that their time is valuable? More valuable than becoming their own glorified check-out clerk for every standard task that needs to get done in the world?
Others are starting to notice this trend. Check out this article: Service gets lost in self-serve world. [Thanks, Faz]. There are a lot of important themes that just barely get touched upon in it. For instance:
But with the explosion of self-serve options, some question what the effect has been on one of mankind's most important attributes--the ability to communicate. Cherie Kerr, a public speaking and communications consultant for ExecuProv, a Santa Ana, Calif., firm, expresses amazement at the number of people she deals with who would rather exchange e-mail than talk on the telephone.
"People are just not connecting as much as they once did, or as they should," said Kerr. "A lot of people do not want to talk to people anymore."
Yeah. And you can tell. People have fewer basic communication skills than they used to. I have never been fond of the phone-- it requires real-time responses without all the visual cues that you get in face-to-face interactions. But I do miss actually interacting with humans sometimes. (Or even if there are humans there, sometimes they are too spaced-out to really talk to the customers they are dealing with, but that's another issue).
And many observers fear that new developments in do-it-yourself technology will exclude the elderly or the poor, especially as companies start charging customers a premium for doing business the old-fashioned way.
This is quite important also. Senior citizens and poor people already feel alienated from regular society. And with the pace of life getting ever faster, they often can't keep up. Now we are going to remove the humans from their lives too? That will only increase the isolation. It's just sad.
As I have begun to tune into these problems with the Internet world, I have found some positive responses. I now make more of an effort to smile at people, make eye contact, and even chat a bit if it's appropriate. I practice being right where I am, not thinking about the next place I'm rushing to.
I try to see the people I meet-- like the check-out person at the grocery store-- as people, not as tools performing a function for me. Now that we have computers replacing them in some cases, it is all the more abundantly clear to me that humans are not computers. They're a lot better to deal with in many cases. (Not always! But you might be surprised how often).
These are simple things that anyone can do. I encourage you to adopt the practice of looking at people, smiling, etc. It's a healthy response to the ever-increasing mechanization of society.
And better yet-- it's something you can do all by yourself, without having anyone do it for you. :-)
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