Part of the reduction in employment is shifting work to the customer (e.g. divining what, specifically, "I want black pens" means).
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Replying to @patio11
If you faxed in an order that said, literally, "I want black pens", I'd call you back and ask whether you wanted the standard Bic ones or /
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Replying to @patio11
something more exotic. If you wanted exotic we could, and sometimes did, have me read to you an entire catalog of pen options.
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Replying to @patio11
These days if you don't know what kind of black pen you want a web app is happy to give you all the time in the world to pick right SKU.
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Replying to @patio11
People sometimes felt guilty about it. "No need, ma'am. This is what I'm here for." Now just between you and me, me not being there is good.
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Replying to @patio11
My fully loaded cost was clocked at about $7 a call on average. $40+ if you spent two hours asking me to explain gel pen varieties to you.
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Replying to @patio11
There were some people in the company I could route you to with actual expertise. We had a Paper Guy. He could have been in forensics.
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Replying to @patio11
If you sent in a piece of paper and wanted that paper -- and folks did -- the Paper Guy knew every kind sold in US and many that weren't.
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Replying to @patio11
But most customers didn't get that level of service. Most just wanted pens and paper, ASAP, cheaply. Me being in the equation added $/time.
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Replying to @patio11
There's also a deeper philosophical point here: who in society do we care about so little that we want them to narrate pen options to live?
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Many of my co-workers were not just passing through order entry. That was where they ended up; the highest and best use of their time.
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Replying to @patio11
Our office was cited where it was explicitly because Midwesterners worked hard, had minimal accent, and were cheap. They told us this.
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Replying to @patio11
There's a great question in what as a society we want folks to do when they're not Seasonal Order Entry Operators any more.
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