The importance of a human touch in the digital age

Given the priority every CEO affords it and the constant requests for feedback I receive, why is customer service so difficult to get right? Over the last month, I have engaged with customer services teams from an airline, a mobile phone company and a financial services company and found myself wondering why it is so difficult to resolve anything other than a routine request.

I have some sympathy with the companies and their staff. All three companies are in sectors that are very price competitive and that have legacy systems built up over many years. Hence finding the resources required to overcome systems and process limitations is challenging.

For any non-routine challenge, addressing the customer's concerns typically requires the creation of a flexible solution that overrides constraints imposed by standardised processes and systems. As an example, my wife was unable to access a loyalty bonus we had signed up for because the system had automatically awarded her a lower value reward and she was only allowed to have one and there was no scope to cancel awards. Weeks of frustration were only ended after several levels of escalation led to a manual override which leaves the award in place but gave her the value of two years of discounts but as an upfront payment.

In the rush to use technology to improve the efficiency of customer service we have removed human discretion, the ability to be able to listen to customers and then apply judgement outside of strict rules. As an example, I would argue we had more rounded and better loan decision-making when local bank managers were empowered to act rather than obey centralised systems.

All the talk today across many domains is of artificial intelligence as the way forward. There is definitely a role for using new capabilities to improve legacy systems and to simplify over-rigid processes and to generate better information. However, I doubt machines will be able to replicate human flexibility given the rigid nature of the systems and processes they will be linked to. The way forward is to use technology to improve the routine activity and free up and empower humans to solve the most challenging problems for customers.