My last two blog posts (here and here) really pushed out the boat in terms of length. Apologies for that… The fact is that they were originally written as one post that was deemed too long by our blogmeister (meaning you really got off lightly!) Having learnt my lesson, I thought I would give myself the challenge of keeping this posting as brief as possible.
On the subject of keeping things short and sweet, one of my favourite stories is the one that Ernest Hemingway allegedly wrote, either as a result of a bet with his drinking buddies or to rise to the challenge of writing a complete story in six words. He absolutely nailed it. Here is the unabridged version:
“For sale: baby shoes, never worn.”
In these times of Twitter, SMS, et al it seems incredible to me that, way back in the 1920s, ‘Papa’ somehow managed to convey a powerful story in less than 27 characters. Who needs 140?
Here at Percepta we pride ourselves on our Microsoft SQL Server based data warehouse and its ability to provide in-depth analysis of customer support calls captured by our CRM application(s). As we move towards supporting multiple channels that, by their very nature are unstructured (particularly if we are trying to analyse customer sentiment from Twitter feeds, product forums, SMS and chat), we recognise the enormity of the challenge we face in trying to interpret this vast unruly data set. Whilst there are tools out there to trap key words in verbatims there are pitfalls here too. Individual words by themselves can’t convey sentiment. They need to be grouped together. Even when they are skillfully grouped together by a master storyteller like Hemingway, what is the sentiment behind his famous short story? Different readers pick up different things. For some it is a tale filled with melancholy and loss. For others it might be seen as a sign of hope – especially in the re-cycling community! Waste not, want not! Either way, you get the drift, I’m sure.
As contact centres move away from simply handling phone calls (where at least the sentiment of the caller could be interpreted by other means – e.g. the increasing decibel level in the ear of the hapless agent when the customer is venting her / his anger), we need to find new ways of picking up these meanings correctly if we are to act upon them. I haven’t found a solution (yet) – though some recent technological offerings show some promise.
True to my word I am going to end this post here.
But, before that… I would like to suggest my own six words’ worth, with an IT manager theme:
“AC dies. Servers fry. Situation Vacant”
If you have any of your own that you would like to share feel free to post a comment back.
To get you started, here’s a wee cracker from Stan Lee in response to a similarly themed article on wired.com :
“Automobile warranty expires. So does engine.”
Or, this great one from author Graham Swift featured in the guardian.co.uk:
“Funeral followed honeymoon. He was 90.”
Until next time…