A complex social issue

[VeeKaChu]

This post will have two components, so if you want to skip the anecdotal part- wherein I may tend to ramble- you can go right to the major premise below;

First the Ironic Anecdote (which requires some backstory- again feel free to skim down to the bolded section to cut to the chase);

I have a sweet gig that I view as a karmic reward for a long period of occupational maltreatment in my earlier years. I work the 12-8am shift in an office in downtown Chicago, where I am blissfully alone and distant from the world of corporate politics. My company- a French-owned concern- provides services to the Futures trading industry that include both front, middles and back end software solutions but also a private global network that connects to the majority of exchanges on the planet.

I'm the only support person for North America during that period, and honestly I probably spend around 15-20% of my time actually working. But it's paramount that the phones do get answered when they ring, and usually when it does get busy it's high pressure, reasonably specialized, and my responses are critical to overall client relations. I also support our other offices globally in matters of US exchanges for thier own clients.

there a gap of 6.5 hours just prior to my shift wherein our phones are forwarded to our Asian support group (and recently this mean calls get answered by HK *or* Sydney). There's not a lot of calls in that period, but again, it's paramount that our clients get the same quality of service as they get from us. Unfortunately that's often not the case. "Asia" often neglects to let us know when our clients call them, they often do not open Incident reports in our Client Database, and when they do communicate with us they often do not provide correct information. Needless to say it's highly frustrating to me to get a call 4 hours into my shift from a pissed-off trader because he called "Asia" 6 hours ago and has not heard back, and I have no knowledge of the situation. And yet this has happened more than once. So that's the background, but only ties into a portion of the premise.

So two mornings ago I come in, open my email, and there's one from our HK office that says simply "Call John at 'Team XXY', the client is non-plussed, and wants to talk to (me) or Roberta (an Account Manager who works 8-5) as soon as they are in". That's all.

Funny thing, there's no 'Team XXY'. I respond asking if the client left a surname, or a callback number, and what was the ticket # for the Incident? All the basic information that a competent support person gets from the client, and then would supply to the client's local office. Simple competence.

I suspect that they mean John K. at 'Team XYZ' - he's their IT manager- but I'll be damned if I'm going to call someone at 01:20am if I'm not certain what's up, as I'd be calling his cell, at home (he works regular 9-5 hours.

"Asia" responds with an email with John K's cell ph#. I call it and leave VM indicating that I'd been asked to call, but as I still did not know what the issue was, if he was still having it to please call me ASAP.

Then another person in "Asia" emails with an incident # that is ascribed to 'XZZ Citigroup', a GOD-DAMNED JAPANESE CLIENT (if they had assigned it to the correct client I would've found it in the Database)!! So not only did they not get correct information from the client, they assigned it to yet a different client because the person who handled the call does not know how to use the tools. However, the call did contain our clients' correct information, and I see that the issue is actually resolved. Pshew.

So a few more hours pass, I give it no more thought... then at 06:21 I get a call from a trader at a client in Toronto. He has an issue, I get his info, tell him I'll look into it and call him back.

At 6:25 I get a call from John K., and there's steam coming out of the phone. Seems he had called initially and got our HK office, and tried communicate the issue but felt that he was not understood because the fellow he spoke with had a heavy accent, and he was promised a call-back and didn't get it, and then he called an hour later and got an indian fellow in our Sydney office who was finally able to help him but goddamn it and blah blah blah and we're going to lose the account, etc etc etc. I let him go on, but I knew he was just venting; however he had a right, and I'm a good listener. I drew a doodle of an angry fellow as he went on, there was nothing for me to actually write down. I said all the proper, conciliatory things, and promised to have his Account Manager call as soon as she was in. This takes about 5 minutes.

Now this is where I finally approach the premise of the post, and then I'll get to the irony- one of the things I hear often from clients, and especially from traders (who are already high-strung and mostly demand that their problems be fixed 10 minutes ago to begin with, because in these cases their time really is money), is that they absolutely, overtly and shamelessly despise speaking to persons with heavy accents. It's often put that simply. It doesn't even seem to factor in that they can and often do get the assistance they seek from these same people, but I'd imagine that you could measure an immediate rise in the blood pressure of many of these traders the instant they hear a foreign voice on the phone.

So as soon as I'm off the phone with John K. (in other words done getting reamed because he had to speak to foreigners- even if they did muff it intially) I proceed to go and resolve the Canadian traders issue. Approximately 15 minutes after he first called, I call him back to confirm that he's working, and he is. And then he goes, "That's the best service I've ever gotten from (my company)."

"Well thanks for saying that", says I.

"You speak excellent english."

"Well I've been doing it all my life..." he laughed, but then he says something along the lines of what I said above, that it's so difficult dealing with people with foreign accents, and how he hates it (there it is again- though he does take pains to point out that he means that not as a racist or bigoted statement, but rather a fact of doing business).

Then he proceeds to get contact information for the Managing Director of our US operations to send him a commendation email for my good services (cc'd to me), wherein he specifically mentions that I spoke the good english and this seemed to be a major factor to him in my ability to solve his simple issue. He understood me, and I understood him. With his subtle Fr.Can patois... yes he was an ESL (English as a Second LAnguage) guy as well!



So the premise- is it 'racist' if you would rather get support from a person who speaks fluent 'american' instead of an "ESL" person of any persuasion?

I don't think it is, I think it's just a fact of business that if your clients express dissatisfaction with any aspect of your support, well that's inherently bad and needs to be addressed/corrected, and they certainly don't like that!

But OTOH, what does it indicate if there's an automatic negative response- which I truly believe there is- upon realizing that you are dealing with a foreigner, even one who does speak well, but with a noticable accent?

DISCUSS!

[PHISH]

Half of the team I work with is in Kulim Malaysia, now, all of them speak English but it is insanely difficult to understand what some are saying, granted the cheap conference speakerphones don't help. Even through email, we can spell out every step to tackling a problem and they will still have problems interpreting it correctly or communicating something back to us. It makes doing business that much harder, at some point we have to ask, "is this really saving money?". Some however, speak very good English, and this basically is directly proportional to how thick their accent is.

Being able to communicate effectively both ways in English is pretty much the main thing customer support folks for American customers are going to be doing, so it makes perfect sense that someone who is difficult to understand or has trouble understanding English is going to frustrate customers. The quality of support service you get from someone who speaks good english is just for the most part going to be better, this includes email conversations so the accent doesn't really come into play..it's just less experience with the language, nothing racist about it.

[dys]

If it's very clear and understandable, i have no problem with it myself. In fact I may find it interesting. As you mentioned though, trying to decipher what someone is saying, particularly from a help desk / support position, it does become quite annoying when they can't pronounce the language, considering the sole purpose in this position is to offer clear answers to someone via phone services.

The last company i worked for offered tax deductions to companies who's employees were eligible based upon certain criteria - many of whom were spanish speaking folk. So, naturally our phone people were bilingual, 90% of whom knew spanish as their first language. I lost track after counting one day but after the 20th time of hearing one lady tell our clients that they were "illegible", instead of "ineligible" I had to say something to their manager. Nothing was done. For over a year I heard this lady telling people they were illegible over the phone and then proceding to try and explain just what the fuck she meant, as I assume the person on the other end was saying "What?".

From my own personal experience, and although not business-related, but along the same lines (stressful situation)as the example given at the beginning of the thread:

Formatting a computer, going through all of the ins and outs, the pains and gains of the inevitable issues that creep up, anyone that's done this knows that this is not a time to smile. It definitely isn't a time that you would like to be interrupted, or go through some mundane process which you believe to be totally uncalled for. Sooo, once your Windows XP key has been used a certain amount of times you have to call Microsoft in order to unlock it on the umpteenth time and they'll give you a new key to use. This is not what I want to do in the middle of a format, but top that off with the fact that I couldn't understand the majority of numbers/letters an obvious Indian-accented person was relaying to me over the phone was enough for me to express my dissatisfaction. Somewhere in Microsoft's QA recorded phone conversations I am now on record stating that if they cannot provide support on a product that they FORCE you to call for, towards their customers with english-speaking support, in their own native country, then I will be pirating from now on. No knocks on my e-doors yet.

So to wrap up my response, I think it's very unprofessional of a business to use phone support employees that do not speak the language, whatever it may be that their job calls for, clearly. Unfortunately, big businesses don't really care about that and that is why outsourcing of such inter-business departments is becoming more and more popular. (Many companies outsource this work to other companies, most of which are out of the country and are not direct employees of who you think you're calling.)

[Kmack]

OK first off to give you my thoughts... I'm going to need to see the picture you drew of the angry person. A scan or digital photo will suffice.

To the primary subject though. It's a tough situation. The trader you are dealing with has English as a secondary language and, according to your description, is a smart, competent, and easy to understand person. One would expect, from a client perspective, that them employees of a vendor would have the same type qualities.

You are going to run into these stereotypes more and more these days... especially with the exponential increase in outsourcing to foreign companies.

What it comes down to though... is as an EMPLOYEE your first reaction should be to defend COMPETENT co-workers regardless of race, gender, or nationality. If the competency level is not there... then you have every right to have issues with them and bring them up to your appropriate higher-ups. And as an EMPLOYEE of a company that was founded (I'm assuming) by persons of the ENGLISH speaking decent... you also have every right to expect proper verbal care of clients (ie. don't make it a pain in the ass for them to deal with you because they can't understand). And if this is an issue, then you have the right to discuss with your higher-ups. I don't think this is going overboard or being a rat... it's all a part of helping run an efficient business.

As an ENGLISH speaking AMERICAN, or in your clients case... an ENGLISH speaking foreigner... one can only expect to receive telephone service that you can understand. I used to spend 40-45 weeks a year on the road and flew Delta Airlines every time. In the case of delays, or flight cancellations... I was grew familiar with Delta's phone service. And it never failed that I ended up talking with someone with a thick accent. And believe me it was difficult to deal with. I dealt with it the best I could... however in the event that I was dealing with someone I could barely understand... I had ABSOLUTELY no quams with asking to speak to someone who could speak better English. I mean, Delta is a company founded in America by English speaking Americans... is it too much to ask to speak to someone who can speak proper English??

In closing this rambling... the fact is that if your co-workers aren't doing their job, they should be reported fot (not) doing so. REGARDLESS of whether they can speak English fluently (or be understood for that fact). If you have clients that have issues with not being able to understand your co-workers solely based on their accent or ability to speak proper English... then changes should be made in your company to avoid your EASL workers dealing with clients fluent in English.

[agi|e]

seriously post a scan of your doodle.

:D

[Zogo]

So the premise- is it 'racist' if you would rather get support from a person who speaks fluent 'american' instead of an "ESL" person of any persuasion?

some will brand it as that..but really this isn't saying that one race has superior linguistic skills..but that some foreigners can't speak english as well..
just like when I knew a lot of spanish in HS..I wouldn't think someone was racist for thinking I wasn't proficient.

really it's not tied to race..I'm sure there are whites/blacks in asia who suck at english too

But OTOH, what does it indicate if there's an automatic negative response- which I truly believe there is- upon realizing that you are dealing with a foreigner, even one who does speak well, but with a noticable accent?

prejudice.

[VeeKaChu]

Good call Zogo, that's a lot closer to the truth of it.
However, when considering the best solutions from a business point of view, there is a built-in "racism" component, as I'll explain.

After the incident I described I had a long discussion with our Managing Director, just to let him that clients were very unhappy with asia support, that "Team XYZ" was talking of dropping us, and that besides the fact that "Asia" was not performing as they should, the clients in the main often expressed dissatisfaction with- again, specifically- dealing with support people with accents (and believe me, they complain as bitterly about talking to French fellows as much as any others). In fact we'd had the same discussion before.

Now, the obvious best solution would be to ONLY have support people that speak fluent, note-perfect "american", at all times, on all lines. But, as we all know that's not possible, because it's overt discrimination, which is illegal. A business, by law, cannot structure itself that way, because it's considered "racism".

And I've always thought it was funny that most of these clients that do complain will take pains to point out that they are not being racist or bigoted, when indeed, as Zogo points out, they are being overtly prejudicial.


Doodle on Monday morning. I actually meant to take a digital snap of it Friday night, to be inserted into a short tract I'm going to work up for a meeting next week on this subject with the CTO and my manager.

[Zogo]

A business, by law, cannot structure itself that way, because it's considered "racism".

And I've always thought it was funny that most of these clients that do complain will take pains to point out that they are not being racist or bigoted, when indeed, as Zogo points out, they are being overtly prejudicial.

that's where equality, equal opportunity, affirmative action and all those other goofy laws come into play. the problem is that in the real world you can't point those contradictions out to most people without starting a giant argument..and by that point most people are too angry to listen.

[Streetwolf]

Despite equal opportunity, etc, can't a company argue that since these people with thick accents cannot properly perform their job, they are not qualified enough to work there?

And yes, part of the 'qualifications' of said job includes being able to speak COHERENTLY.

[rezin]

I don't think this issue can be viewed as a form of racism or any sort of discrimination. It's in a company's best interest, and is completely legal, to hire employees who will do their job the best.

If you were to get a job that requested "bi-lingual" skills in Spanish (as a lot of customer service jobs are now in the US), and you did not speak fluent Spanish or close to it, if you were fired from that job, you could not view that as discrimination due to the fact that you were not competent in that position. It's the same with the Asian employees, they are not speaking english well enough to be understood and are not satisfying their job expectations.

[Solo]

That the Rezin that was in ][ and [NCA]?

[MV8]

Think about it.

When everybody is bilingual, we will only need one language...

[Zogo]

Despite equal opportunity, etc, can't a company argue that since these people with thick accents cannot properly perform their job, they are not qualified enough to work there?

sometimes yes and sometimes no..it depends on the laws of the country..and even local laws.

When everybody is bilingual, we will only need one language...

what do you mean?

[FireWall]

Think about it.

When everybody is bilingual, we will only need one language...

Unfortunately, no, because there are cultural considerations as well.

[puFf]

Good story Veekachu

I'm in the support gig too. On the other side of the coin, I've also sometimes had a hell of a time understanding some native english speaker's accent's. Especially over the phone. Even more especially over a crappy cell phone connection. Tough to help sometimes if you can't understand what they're saying.

Can understand the fustration from the client side too if you feel like you're are getting sent in circles and have to constantly repeat their story. Personally I hate excessive phone trees more than the accent. But like you said you're dealing with a little more high stung people unlike myself (for the most part).

Favorite support quote, although unrelated, was from listening to my dad (the mechanic for at that time a moped dealer) give support to an irrate caller that couldn't assemble and get his moped to work. Dad: "Well you're never going to get it to work with an attitude like that. Take a break. Call me back later when your attitude changes." He called back a couple hours later wit "Ok, I have a better attitude now." They got it working shortly there after.

From your story, thought you got it handled in much the same way. GJ Veek. First you have to mellow them out a bit.

[spin]

Im not sure if it would be considered racist or not, but i have definately run into this situation a few times in my year long college career. last year, both of my chem lab TA's (there were actually about 4 of them) had heavy indian accents and one had an asian accent (but i can deal with asian accents). The professor that did the lectures first semester had a rather heavy asian accent, and when i couldnt understand what they were saying sometimes, i got very frustrated.

racist or not, it definately has a huge effect on the learning curve and corporate relations. its just something we have to deal with :/

[VeeKaChu]

It's in a company's best interest, and is completely legal, to hire employees who will do their job the best.
Yes and no.

If a company had a policy to NOT hire people with accents- i.e., willing only to hire American born and bred, and thus "perfect speakers", that would be extremely illegal. Sure there are companies that might do this, but if they had it as a stated policy- or even if it could be proven to be the case- they are violating the law.


http://www.veekachu.com/images/doodle.jpg

[RogueCheddar]

Consummate V's! Consummate!

[rezin]

Yes and no.

If a company had a policy to NOT hire people with accents- i.e., willing only to hire American born and bred, and thus "perfect speakers", that would be extremely illegal. Sure there are companies that might do this, but if they had it as a stated policy- or even if it could be proven to be the case- they are violating the law.




True, but in this case we are not talking about a minor accent, or lack of perfect "american speak". If someone's accent, or lack of English skills, makes them almost unintelligible and their main job is to be understood, that defaults to a problem with competency and unfortunately or not, they run the risk of getting fired from that position.

[defjux]

In my experience with calling tech support, I really don't think it matters what accent the person is using, as long as they seem to be concerned with my problem. If they are ultimately helpful and we get to a solution in a reasonably direct manner then it doesn't matter if they sounded Indian, Japanese, or American.

This may have already been said, but I would rather have an Indian person who was to the point and could understand me than somebody who spoke fluent English but didn't do an effective job of solving my problem.

I guess once I start talking with them, I may innately have lower expectations if they have an accent, just because they would be less likely to speak perfect English. Someone who sounded like the people I talk to on a daily basis would subconsciously give me some comfort, but as I said above, it all depends on whether my problem gets solved.

[Tone-Loc]

Language proficiency requirements are not racist.

There are plenty of ESL folks who you might hardly know are ESL. I work with a young lad who is Iraqi. I haven't one wit of trouble understanding him... of course he has spent many years in Georgia and more recently in Tennessee, but its obvious he was raised with English for the majority of his life.

Then on the other hand, we have a another young lad (contract worker) from India somewhere... and I constantly have a hard time with the guy... and I am particulary fluent in most forms of broken english from my years and years of customer service at a national and a global level. My team leader has taken to calling him Mowgli (a la the Jungle Book), which although immediately causes me much uncontrolled snickering, is borderline racist and I have warned him that he is walking the edge with such a nickname.

[EyjaPia]

We have to remember that by the time we call tech support most of us are pretty frustrated and simply from the sound of an accent we've decided that this person is not going to be of any help.

My mother is a nurse manager with a thick Icelandic accent. By the time her nurses come to her, they're frustrated because they cannot figure out the problem on their own. And then they decide she can't help. People just look at her and say "what? what?" without even trying to listen. It's that attitude thing. If you've decided you don't understand me, it's too late.

People who learn languages after childhood will have accents that don't go away. They do need to learn to speak slowly and over-articulate but we on the other side have to listen better. They are speaking their second or third language- you are being asked to listen closely to your native tongue.

Of course, some people simply have trouble communicating and at that point it is not impolite to simply say "I'm sorry I keep having trouble understanding you. Is there perhaps someone else who can help me?" A competent employee will either find a way to communicate with a customer or pass on the job to someone who can.

[Tone-Loc]

I am sure most of us here in our professional capacities fully understand and agree with everything you said.

However, why that's understood of professionals, like ourselves, it's not very realistic, practical, or even advised to basically record what you wrote in a message to be played up front to any customer calling for help. I think you will find your customer agreeing with you, and calming themselves down and then calmly and cooly deciding that they can get better service somewhere else.

[EyjaPia]

OK so I think I understand what you're saying. And technically a company should hire someone who can best fulfill the position , and a lot of the time it's based on what the customer wants. So a company should hire people who speak English the way the customer wants.

...But, could that be compared to a customer preferring to be served by a white employee (or white-sounding)? Or even someone preferring to talk to a male? All based on personal prejudices.

I wonder how would an employer make that call?

[stas]

OK so I think I understand what you're saying. And technically a company should hire someone who can best fulfill the position , and a lot of the time it's based on what the customer wants. So a company should hire people who speak English the way the customer wants.

...But, could that be compared to a customer preferring to be served by a white employee (or white-sounding)? Or even someone preferring to talk to a male? All based on personal prejudices.

I wonder how would an employer make that call?

in a job that is 90% communication and 10% knowledge/execution, its not discriminatory at all to ask or expect someone who fluently speaks your language. skin color does not affect your ability to serve, your accent does.

[Zogo]

...But, could that be compared to a customer preferring to be served by a white employee (or white-sounding)? Or even someone preferring to talk to a male? All based on personal prejudices.

you're not prejudicing once you hear the person can't talk well enough.

[EyjaPia]

But having an accent does not mean that a person is not fluent in the language. It simply means they were raised with different phonetics and are having to re-train their bodies to speak.

At that point, however, it would be considered a job qualification to speak without an accent. Radio personalities and phone service operators are hired based on the sound of their voice. If someone's job is based on the phone, then they must be able to communicate effectively over the phone.

[Tone-Loc]

It's not about the mere existence of an existence (that would be racist), its the severity of the accent, and if it reasonably impairs others from being able to understand a common language.

[stas]

It's not about the mere existence of an existence (that would be racist), its the severity of the accent, and if it reasonably impairs others from being able to understand a common language.

agreed. you have to realize that if your accent so affects a conversation that you cannot have a fluid one, you are probably not fluent.

[Zogo]

But having an accent does not mean that a person is not fluent in the language.

for all intents and purposes "fluent" means being able to understand clearly..so if some job offering says "must be fluent in..." that means you need to be understandable..even if there is some guy who has a million word vocabulary but talks like a weirdo they won't cut it.

[Randy Travis]

Yes...
fluent in any language means capable of understanding and being
understood..

proficient in its use...

someone who speaks in an indiscernable manner can't be consider proficient in the use of language.. its like someone doing sign language but missing half the signs.. would you hire them?

[Rand]

It all boils down to the almighty dollar, or yen, or, well, money. Companies will find a balance point between overseas non-fluent customer service versus someone that can communicate to you in the language and technical proficiency that you need. Some companies will stay with the lower cost customer service, and thus lose all their client base, while others will play the 'competition' game better, and stay in business. My personal feeling is that during this drawn out period, as during say deregulation of utilities for the common man that supposedly promote competition and supposedly lower rates, the individual will pay higher and higher prices for lower and lower service or goods. When said company finally goes belly up since it cannot service its customers, all its shareholders are out of luck, well, besides the ones in the know that got out when it was lucrative.

On the subjective side of Veek's post:

It is rascism? I do not think so, personally. Some very heavily thick accented people that I know can communicate well. But, and that's a mighty big but, over the phone is a different thing. If you call to a supposedly domestic service company, people expect to be able to communicate to them. I recall a coworker's story of he and his son trying to get his son's new Xbox to work through their internet router. It took him a full 10 minutes to understand what the Indian sounding person was saying, along the lines of "You need to forward the ports." The description of said customer service rep saying, "Ports... P as is Paul, O as in Oscar...." should have been on SNL. Episodes like these pre-condition us all to our expectations upon a conversation.

Especially the one where we went to buy our new Honda Civic family car, and it was an Indian sounding guy.......

Oh well, enough from me.

[VeeKaChu]

So, did anyone see the new Gateway Computers ad lately? I only saw it once, so my recollection is not exact, but basically it's a B&W montage of shiny happy consumers extolling the life-enhancing virtues of dealing with teh world's greateset support system; then white text on a black background words to the effect (and this is not an exact quote, but close) "Now with 100% North America-based customer support.", and then Gateway logo-age.

It is a direct and open response to exactly the topic of this thread- people have no qualms about telling corporations explicitly that it bothers them to talk to a person with an accent.

The funny thing is that there is probably still a noticable percentage of people in at Gateway in N.A. that are "ethnic". They'd get killed in court if they tried to purge their Call Center(s) of those people.

And isn't it a little cynical? "Hey, buy a PC from us, and when it breaks you won't have to talk to Bishwalla!"

[dys]

Didn't see the commercial but assuming you didn't make up the quote entirely ( :p ) it exemplifies everything your thread was meant for. Couldn't be more suited to your point. Good thread indeed.

[MidnightStalker]

I think that quote has more to do with anger towards outsourcing than accents. Just me though.

[Zogo]

I read an article yesterday from the viewpoint of people in india:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20061113/lf_nm/life_india_callcentres_dc_1

[Corsair]

I worked as a Senior GM for Dungeons and Dragons Online. If our first tier outsourced GMs were really having sex and doing drugs while at work, I have to say, I'm somewhat jealous. I usually sat alone at my desk, or with one other person and actually... did work. I missed out, clearly.

[Randy Travis]

they could probably justify it as a competitive advantage (which having customer service people who fucking speak English is). I'm all for accommodation, but when people lack a basic skill necessary for the fucking job they shouldn't be hired.

Cheers to gateway... North-America based doesn't necessarily mean of Caucasian origin, either.