Prejudice

Prejudice.  Is there ever a single word that immediately provokes such intense emotion? We are often influenced by prejudice in one form or another. To be clear, I am not talking about racial prejudice, I'm talking about prejudgement becoming prejudicial to an open mind.

We prejudge others based on how their looks, what they are wearing, how they talk, what car they drive, who they associate with, where they live, the list goes on. 

Prejudging is more commonly known as generalisations, placing people and things into categories or boxes.  This can be a positive thing and can help keep us safe. You wouldn't walk headlong into a group of rowdy drunk people for example because you know the likely outcome. You prejudged the situation and came to a sound decision.

Prejudging stems from our extrinsic learnings; how we were raised, the friends we had, the interactions with others and a myriad of other influencers. However, prejudging becomes detrimental when it becomes prejudicial because reality is confused with our perceptions. 

Prejudices are based largely from negative events that we encountered which cloud our future interactions. They close-off our minds.

Here's an example.  I trained with the elite military forces of New Zealand, Australia and the United Kingdom. For those that know how hard these people train, you would have a vision of me in your head and placed me into a category.  I trained with these teams on military exercises, I was a negotiator talking on the phone. Now you're brain has probably taken me from one box and placed me into another. 

We do the same with voices.  We hear a voice on the phone and immediately have a vision of what that person looks like and respond accordingly. The last time you heard a voice on the radio you had a vision of that radio host and when you saw them in real life you were fascinated at how that voice could come out of that mouth. It was not the person you had pictured in your mind. When speaking with them in person you probably won’t hear what they are saying because your prejudgement doesn’t meet reality.

The next time you find yourself being influenced by prejudicial thoughts, know that it is just your brain protecting you from earlier encounters. Acknowledge then dismiss these negative thoughts as they are probably incorrect.

Keep an open mind when meeting new people, you will be pleasantly surprised at how similar we all are. Or maybe they aren’t which is even more fascinating.

Unplanned Absences - Abenteeism

Unplanned absenteeism is something that you may have to tackle as an additional item to improving the work environment. Despite your best efforts, absenteeism will always be an issue for call centres. If you have provided agents with the carrot – a fun environment – and absenteeism is still an issue you may have to introduce the ‘half-carrot’ approach. The half-carrot is not as harsh as the stick, threats and punishment do not work and only cause angst for everyone. In fact the stick method will have the reverse affect. If you have tried many things and short-term absences are causing an issue for your workforce team, you may consider introducing the Bradford identification tool.

The Bradford formula was developed at the Bradford University School of Management and is a human resource tool that identifies the most disruptive of absences by highlighting staff who take numerous short absences reported as illness, and provides an opportunity to focus assistance and support for those staff with a high score to return to full health. Intervention strategies for staff with long-term illnesses will be different from those with numerous short-term health issues and the Bradford formula is just one indicator which should inform effective management.

The calculation is the number of unrelated absence periods² multiplied by the number of days absent. For example, let's take 10 days absence in the reference period you chose (a year is the norm). If an employee took 10 consecutive days off work, [(1 x 1) x 10] equals a score of 10. The reason for the low score is it was just one absence therefore easier to plan for. Five absences of two days each which would be [(5 x 5) x 10] with a score of 250 whereas ten absences of one day each would end with a score of 1000. Note: The calculation is simply designed to identify staff who take lots of single days away from work across a year. It is not designed for any other reason and further investigation is required to establish why the employee needs the time away.

In a call centre where I was the manager of staff development, we set a score of 500 as the benchmark for the introduction of intervention strategies. This number was based on the average absence days across the year for all staff. A further consideration is the number of sick days per annum that staff are entitled to. If they have eight days per annum and take each as a single day the calculation would be 640. However given that most people have two or three consecutive days off over winter due to influenza then the calculation remains under 500. Importantly, the service organisation (union) were consulted and engaged throughout to ensure there was a full understanding of why the identification tool was being used. Similarly, terminology needs to be conducive to a positive introduction. Replace the word punishment with intervention, the word rule with guide, rehab with wellness, etc.

The intervention strategies included; not permitted to work overtime, no higher duties, off-site activities were declined, no volunteer work or secondary employment allowed. Agents also had to produce a medical certificate for each absence, paid for by the employer. There are many other interventions which are dependent on the type of call centre.

Guidelines are relaxed for those who for example had been afflicted with a single illness or injury which was now cured or healed. Examples of a singular event would include an operation, hospitalisation, etc. Other options to soften the guides include allowing overtime on financial hardship grounds, removing one month’s score if the employee attended continuously for one month without an absence, and not counting the absences if it was to assist their recovery such as elective surgery for a condition which was impacting on their wellbeing.

Remember, this is for the benefit of the employee. It is to identify those people who may be struggling at work and need your assistance. Use it wisely.

Exercise, I Don't Think So.

After sleep, exercise is the second most important thing that you can do to keep yourself mentally well. Exercise creates endorphins in the brain, those natural feel good drugs that provide you with a sense of euphoria. Long distance runners often speak of them and is the reason why some continue running through pain, the more pain the more endorphins the better the euphoric feeling.

Endorphins are the body’s natural opiate. They aren't addictive so don't panic. However, you may feel a little low if you do not get your usual 'fix' of endorphins each day that comes with your regular exercise routine.

You don’t have to run a marathon to get the health benefits of endorphins. Thirty minutes of moderate continuous activity is all it takes. Walking at a medium to fast pace is sufficient and the faster you run the greater the benefit. If walking or running isn't your thing then try vacuuming the house for 30 minutes continuously and see how that feels. Or mow the lawns, trim the hedge and wash the car without stopping.

It takes 30 minutes to get blood from your big toe circulating up to your brain and back again after travelling through your plumbing, the pipes and filters known as the kidney, liver and other necessary organs that take the rubbish out of your body.

Exercise is also how we remove excess adrenaline. Adrenaline is pumped into the body whenever we become stressed, when we feel the need to fight or to flee. Excess adrenaline causes unnecessary anxiety and if left unchecked can cause serious physiological and psychological harm.

A lesser known reaction to the excess release of adrenalin is diarrhoea. If we face a frightening situation, large amounts of adrenalin get released into the body with some of the chemical leaving the body out the rear exit. So, the next time you think you may have eaten a bad meal, think back as it may just be that you had a fright a few days earlier!

Back to exercise, the reason we are told to get more exercise than the suggested 30 minutes is simply to reduce weight. It's all about energy in and energy out. If you eat more or eat the wrong foods, you need to exercise more. And the better the food that you eat the greater the benefit and the healthier you will feel.

So, grab that vacuum cleaner and start working out.

My Dreams Aren't Weird, Are They?

To function adequately you need seven to eight hours sleep each night, preferably unaided by drugs or alcohol. A person can last for about 72 hours without any sleep whatsoever until it becomes detrimental to their health. Eleven days is the longest anyone has gone without sleep before they died. Yikes! This is not said to scare you, rather it is to reassure you that when you think you haven’t slept for a few nights it is most likely that you have. You just haven’t gone into REM sleep.

Rapid eye movement (REM) is when we dream and allows our brain to go through the day’s events. We enter a series of sleep cycles across the night with each REM period increasing in duration. A full sleep cycle lasts between 90 and 120 minutes and we will have four to five cycles each night. If you are sleeping poorly you may only have just the one cycle hence you will feel tired and your brain may not function as it should.

Looking at your brain using a computer analogy, dreams are important as they allow our brain to 'defrag' the events of the day. When we have a weird dream, say the one where the lion jumped onto the boat as we were flying over a mountain, it is our brain not quite putting the files in the correct file tray as it works through events. During the day you would have seen the picture of a lion, travelled on a boat, and watched a movie about flying so your brain just mashed it up a bit and came up with this version. Don’t worry about these dreams, they are normal.

Bad dreams are where your brain is struggling because you have probably been involved in something that has impacted your amygdala (the emotions part of your brain) causing an emotional response. That active memory is then stored in your hippo-campus (the brain’s vault of memories) and has left an impact, a scar or mark in your hippo-campus. Don’t be bothered by one or two nights of bad dreams. If the bad dreams carry on for more than three days then you should go and see a professional to put some perspective on what is occurring.

The other thing that may have caused the bad dream is that you are hot. No, not in that way, temperature hot. Our brain continues to operate if it is warm hence we have trouble getting to sleep when the air temperature is high. If you wake up from a nightmare try removing a blanket and see what happens, I bet it works.

Stop Arguing With Me!

I was asked yesterday by a follower if I was able to provide some advice around managing customers who continued to argue their point and did not accept what they were being told by the service representative.  Hmmm, good luck with them.

There are some people who just like to argue regardless of what you tell them, then there are others who see themselves as always being right.  These dogmatic people have a higher degree of narcissism than most of us.  Their sense of self-importance and need to focus on themselves is at the extreme end of the communication continuum and are very difficult to appease.

There are several ways to manage this type of person.  The best way that I have found is to make it all about them, more than you would with other people.  Use sentences such as "You make a good point", "I can see where you are coming from", or “This would frustrate you". 

The difficulty arises when you can't actually help them.  For example, the company policy disallows you from doing what the customer has asked of you.  Honesty is the best policy but with an explanation as to why.  I call it 'the reason for the reason'. 

Policies are developed for two reasons; to protect the company and to protect the customer, more so the former reason in most situations.  Often we will say, "I'm sorry but I can't do what you are asking because it is our company policy".  You know what the customer hears when we say this - "We have rules for situations like this and I can't change them". 

Try explaining to the customer why the policies are in place, to protect them.  Say "Lance, I apologise that I cannot help do any more for you.  We value our customers and have policies which are designed to protect everyone". Try variations of this as it has to be said in your own words otherwise it sounds disingenuous. For example “Our policies have been developed over years of business Lance to protect everyone, I apologise that there is little I can do to change this”.   

Breaking down this sentence - Use the customer’s name early in the sentence to personalise the conversation, use the word 'apologise' as it is more formal than the word sorry and we say sorry far too often so it also becomes disingenuous. Then explain why the policies are in place, to protect everyone them included.

Finish off the conversation by giving the customer something that they can take away, it need not be tangible although this would be more helpful. It could be as simple as “What I am going to do is to mention your situation to my supervisor as you raise a valid point”. Be honest remember, if you lie you will lose credibility and a customer. Always do what you say you are going to and don’t over-promise. Under-promise and over-deliver.

Bottom line, sometimes people just have to have a reality check.