Are you a robot? or: Stop Sucking at Being Human

This is a modified version of an Ignite-style “Lightning Talk” that I gave on March 21st, 2017 at SupConf, a biannual conference for support professionals.

Who here has gotten this question before, from a customer? I’ll bet almost everyone here has, at one point.

On the internet, no one knows if you’re a dog, or a human, or a chatbot, and the gap between humans and chatbots gets smaller every year.

According to Forrester Research, 6% of jobs in this country will be replaced by AI in just the next 5 years, with the biggest impact felt in transportation, logistics, and most notably… customer service.

Here’s a picture of a crocodile eating a Croc shoe. Very ironic.

What’s also ironic is how we’re helping AI eat us (customer support professionals) up as well. AI learns from past human behavior, so every single message you send to customers helps train the robots that will one day replace you.

No one wants to be replaced by a robot. But bots are wayyy cheaper than humans, and as long as that’s the case, we’ll keep seeing more and more of them.

WINTER IS COMING, and you can either deny it, or start preparing for it now.

How did it come to this?

Before we start talking about solutions, we first need to explore the problem and understand WHY this happened in the first place.

AI has gotten better. But at the same time, humans have actually gotten worse at being human as well.

Being human is not easy, and so many human beings fail at it. Just like how common sense isn’t common, being human is a skill we all have to learn.

It’s also not permanent. Once learned, it has to be actively maintained. We have to work to maintain it, because too often we let ourselves be shaped by the machines we use, rather than making them conform to us.

As a result, our thoughts and behavior tend to become less human and more machine-like over time.

Most corporations are like this. Employees are treated like cogs in a machine, programmed by executives to mindlessly do their bidding.

Workers are stripped of their ability to to be spontaneous, creative, and independent. The very things that make us human.

The things that make us better than animals — like math, logic, and pattern recognition — are now our biggest weaknesses, because computers are inherently way better at those things than we are.

The sooner we all acknowledge this, the sooner we can properly differentiate ourselves.

The first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem. Now that we’ve done so, how can we start recovering our lost humanity?

There are a lot of ways, too many to mention here, but here are three that you can start implementing now to make your team irreplaceable.

1) Personality

We force customers to talk to so many different agents during their lifetime, and sometimes just in a single conversation!

In that sense, even the Amazon Echo is more human than us. At least Alexa always responds to the same name and has the same voice.

Don’t be a faceless corporation to your customers. Create a consistent personality that’s unique and impossible to forget.

Talk to your customers like an old friend. Don’t treat them like just another ticket to be cleared from your inbox.

2) Memories

Even the best chatbots struggle with long-term memory and internal consistency, and can generally only respond to your most recent message.

Every time we interact with customers without fully appreciating their previous history with us, we’re making the same mistake.

Shared memories & experiences are what take relationships to the next level. When speaking with customers, use and reference your shared history to make a more meaningful connection.

Show them how much you care, by showing them how much you remember.

3) Empowerment

Many companies treat frontline agents like programmed bots, giving them standardized scripts and restricting their decision-making powers.

This is why many customers expect as little from frontline agents as they would from a chatbot.

On the other hand, every Navy SEAL is able to make critical decisions without waiting for orders, in order to be as responsive and adaptive as possible. (This philosophy applies to the U.S. Marine Corps as well, see page 78 of their classic handbook Warfighting)

Train and empower your own frontline team to handle all types of complex edge cases, without having to ask for permission.

Winter is Coming

The day when AI can pass for human and resolve customer issues on its own is close… much closer than many of us would imagine.

Customer support will require a very different skillset in the next 5 years. Will you be ready when it happens?

AI keeps getting better, but I see that as a good thing that will push humans to a higher level and bring out the best in us, like in any great rivalry.

It’s time for us to go all-in on the things that make humans truly exceptional.

Thankfully, there are still several areas where humans are superior to AI, like improvisation, storytelling, and humor.

But like Aragorn’s badass sword here, our strengths as humans are only effective if we use them regularly and keep them sharp.

For those interested in learning more… If you only read one book about AI this year, I suggest you make it this one: The Most Human Human by Brian Christian.

It’ll change the way you think about AI and your own humanity, and help you become a better support pro as well.

Thanks for reading! My name’s Peter Shin and I currently work as a Product Analyst (and previously Technical Support) at Olark, where we make live chat software for online sales and support. I love learning about how advances in AI might change society for better and worse, and at Olark we’re interested in how better AI will change the way consumers interact with businesses.