Outsourcing at the drive-thru

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Originally Posted by Kevy Baby

How hard are they going to work making themselves understandable?

As long as people give feedback regarding their service, and if the bosses pay attention to satisfaction, they'll work hard to make themselves heard clearly.

Originally Posted by lashbear

This is the reason I will be avoiding call centres when I look for work after the trip (Emphasis mine, of course, my comments in brackets):

It's all out of Snow Crash. If this kind of stuff continues to escalate we'll have a second rise of unions, much as the industrial revolution brought on unions 100 years ago. Too bad this isn't the case in most other places in the world and will just make us even weaker in the world marketplace, as other countries continue to exploit their workforces.

Originally Posted by MouseWife

Another thing that I don't appreciate? The threat of being replaced by outsourcing/machines. I am a cashier and they've threatened to put in self service registers. It is insulting {compare it to saying a monkey could do your job}.

Ya know, once these people are gone, who will be next? The managers income will come down because they aren't handling as many employees. The business itself won't have as many employees, how safe does that make the business? Will they only accept debit/credit so they don't have cash?

{sorry...just had a really good cup of coffee.... }

But yeah, a sore spot. I love the technology but then I don't, too.

As someone who works with self-checkout technology, I don't see this as an insult to my station. It would be an insult to everyone's intelligence if these jobs that have been rendered so simple anyone can do them still required salaried people to do them.

I've probably posted this before. I love it when I get a patron who comes to the desk and says "I came to you because I want you to keep your job." I smile, scan their card with one hand and pull their stack of books onto the pad with the other. After 2 seconds, I push the books back. "Due in 3 weeks." They blink and sputter, saying, "is that it?" Yes, yes it is.

It's easy for me to say, since there are still plenty of tasks at the library that require my help. But while I hate it when anyone loses their job, I'd also not want to pay for salaries when the jobs really aren't necessary.

I came up with a silly analogy for this. Let's say that there was no paper technology. All information had to carved onto tablets or written on slates or simply remembered. If you wanted to remember lots of things you'd have to hire people to remember them for you. A string of rememberers would follow you all day long. If someone invented paper, it would mean joblessness for all those employees, but it would be really stupid to ignore such an innovation.