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AI replacing customer service agents

Iain

I notice that the rate of customer service agents being replaced by AI is accellerating with around 85% of these service companies targetting the roles for AI replacement.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cz913ylq3k3o 
AI will autonomously resolve 80% of common customer service issues by 2029, predicts business and technology research firm Gartner.

I worked in this area more or less for 32 years at all levels - from front line telephone support to senior management and having worked in over a dozen companies can say with some confidence that this arena attracts a lot of neurodivergent people.

Why does it attract them? I think becauese it is an entry into the IT world for many so it really just a stepping stone, while for others who are struggling with other roles then this is the safety net that almost anyone can be dropped into if they are unable to do other roles.

It doesn't require a lot of organisational skill as the work typically just arrives in your queue of tasks and you need to work through them in priority order, all of which a decent helpdesk software package will do for you.

It does require a lot of customer interaction however and this would typically be the sticking point, other than the constant ringing of phones that is.

In retrospect I have seen many people with noticable neurodivergent traits come into these roles and often burn out due to the unrelenting stress the role brings.

If AI replaces so many of these roles, where will the neurodiverse be able to get onto the ladder in IT now?

The article also covers some notable failures of the AI systems logic. I was involved in building an AI system to replace my department in my last job and ended up spending 90% of my time creating knowledge base articles to train it with as it lacked the ability to think laterally about how to resolve problems.

It was good enough for a triage system for faults and could resolve around 65% on first contact which was good for the first iteration of it, but the effort to increase this resolve rate by even 10% more was almost as much as the whole project to date.

Where we see upper management pushing these cost saving systems without checking they have enough staff to deal with the inevitable failings then we will see a lot more cases like we do in the article.

If you have ever worked in IT or customer support, how many of you have been through this department as part of your career?

Parents

  • I don't like Ai "helper's" and FAQ's they never seem to have the answer to any questions I have.

    Is customer service a way into IT roles? 

    I'm surprised that many ND people see this as a way into IT, is it they they see it that way or are they told by job advisors that this is so? I know I couldn't cope working in a place with constantly ringing phones a script to work from when answering customer questions, the time pressures that are handed out by management. Being yelled at by frustrated and angry customers would do me in too, so I'm not surprised at the high burn out rate, I'd bet it's not just ND people who burn out either, I've known a few people who've worked in customer support and all but one have hated it.

  • in reply to TheCatWoman
    TheCatWoman said:
    Is customer service a way into IT roles? 

    It customer service is certainly one of the lower level IT roles and one that many people use to get their foot in the door for an IT career as it has the least requirement for experience.

    The scripts mean that so long as you understand the basic technology behind it and can cope with the pressure then you can probably do the job. Anything beyond your ability will be logged and passed to a second or third line technician who will have the skills.

    Over time you build on your knowledge, network with other teams in IT and from there can apply for other positions, thus moving up the ladder career wise.

    Most companies won't employ someone without experience for roles other than this so it has been the most common entry point I have seen over the last 4 decades.

    TheCatWoman said:
    I've known a few people who've worked in customer support and all but one have hated it.

    It is a horrible job most of the time and will typically have a high churn of staff for this reason. This is why it is accepted as a starting point and few will want to stay there long term unless the company has a relatively low work load for them.

    For non-IT customer service roles it is even worst on the whole - many have limited time to resolve a call and have their pay dependant of performance. I've worked with a few managers of these systems who were suffering unsustainable losses of staff and I typically had to tell them to stop being so tyrannical about it.

    Remembering that these are humans under pressure and not robots is essential and finding ways to give them enough time to breathe and lower their stress levels makes a huge difference.

    Offering a potential way out also gave them hope. I would offer to let one them work with me for a week if they showed an aptitude for IT if they met their managers criteria for the "reward" and I used to treat my own team as a nurturing ground for other departments too which had a small impact in performance but a big uplift in engagement.

Reply
  • in reply to TheCatWoman
    TheCatWoman said:
    Is customer service a way into IT roles? 

    It customer service is certainly one of the lower level IT roles and one that many people use to get their foot in the door for an IT career as it has the least requirement for experience.

    The scripts mean that so long as you understand the basic technology behind it and can cope with the pressure then you can probably do the job. Anything beyond your ability will be logged and passed to a second or third line technician who will have the skills.

    Over time you build on your knowledge, network with other teams in IT and from there can apply for other positions, thus moving up the ladder career wise.

    Most companies won't employ someone without experience for roles other than this so it has been the most common entry point I have seen over the last 4 decades.

    TheCatWoman said:
    I've known a few people who've worked in customer support and all but one have hated it.

    It is a horrible job most of the time and will typically have a high churn of staff for this reason. This is why it is accepted as a starting point and few will want to stay there long term unless the company has a relatively low work load for them.

    For non-IT customer service roles it is even worst on the whole - many have limited time to resolve a call and have their pay dependant of performance. I've worked with a few managers of these systems who were suffering unsustainable losses of staff and I typically had to tell them to stop being so tyrannical about it.

    Remembering that these are humans under pressure and not robots is essential and finding ways to give them enough time to breathe and lower their stress levels makes a huge difference.

    Offering a potential way out also gave them hope. I would offer to let one them work with me for a week if they showed an aptitude for IT if they met their managers criteria for the "reward" and I used to treat my own team as a nurturing ground for other departments too which had a small impact in performance but a big uplift in engagement.

Children
  • in reply to Iain

    I think I must have got to know pretty much all the customer service staff from a large national furniture shop, after two delievery drivers refused to even try and get our new furniture off the van and into our house. All the staff were great, but the system they were working with seemed to confuse them as well as me and the staff in the shop. It took a while to get our furniture as it had to go through the process for "returned furniture", it took a couple of weeks of daily and sometimes twice daily phone calls, but we got there in the end. The big boss customer services chap I ended up speaking too, was so angry and appalled at the delievery drivers I think they will be sacked by now, especially as the drivers who eventually delievered the furniture said they had form for it and did stuff like this pretty much every week.