Devoted to the call center industry, the agents on the phones, and their managers

Is customer service a career that sensible people try to leave as soon as possible? For some people, the answer to that question is a unqualified Yes. Yet asking that question on a public web forum a few months after I started my job earned me a worried visit with both my managers at once. They were afraid that someone would suspect that our customer service representatives were unhappy.

It wouldn't take much imagination to imagine that our customer service agents were unhappy. We were paid little and trained little. Morale was low.

But for me, the main reason for low morale, and lack of professional attitude, was that we were not treated like professionals. People without college educations were having to make quick decisions about telecommunications policy, even telecommunications law.

But our managers rarely encouraged us to gather knowledge. When veterans reps left, our managers didn't mind if their racks were thrown out. In fact, mine was, by accident, thrown out by another supervisor while I was moving to another desk.

Advancement was rarely discussed. I think our managers were hoping we wouldn't figure out that we could transfer to another department, or get promoted to quality assurance. If they could keep us in the dark about our career path,that would save them from having to train our replacements or deal with attrition.

Though we worked for a telephone company, our managers never suggested that we learn more about telecommunications in idle time between calls. They were surprised when I did. They never sent us to refresher courses or advanced courses.

Perhaps our managers didn't expect much from us. Maybe they thought we would never be more than entry level employees. So most of us didn't want to disappoint them.