Robert, a loyal MR reader, writes to me:
Are there any airlines where the flight staff speak/behave more "naturally," as opposed to the robotic beauty queen default? I don't mean this in a snarky way. I'm just curious, since customers don't seem to be overly fond of the default mode, and some folks actively dislike it. I also imagine the enforced pleasantness to be a relatively tough/emotionally costly act for most flight attendants to keep up. However, I am not sure how customers would react to more natural flight-attendant speech, body language etc., given expectations of default behaviour.
My longstanding view is that half of them dislike or sometimes even despise their customers and that their natural speech patterns, given their true feelings, would come across negatively. Perhaps Air Genius Gary Leff can comment on the cross-sectional variations vis-a-vis different airlines. But the problem is a tough one. They face lots of customers, with varying and often unreasonable expectations, and they have few resources to buy them off with.
In which sectors do the service staff have the highest opinions of their customers? (Do you have nominations? How about the old days at Tower Records? How about an indie bookstore?) I would expect a greater extent of plain speak in those situations.
What should we infer about doctors? Ladies of the evening? Economics professors?
Addendum: Gary responds.
Ya, you gotta be careful what you wish for. Do you REALLY want your flight attendant to tell you what he/she thinks of you after you drool, demand and debate for the umpteenth time?
Methinks not.
Regards,
Robert E. Coli
CEO Thromby Air – Lowest of the Low
http://www.thrombyair.com
I was on a Northwest Airlines (?) flight in the 90′s that had the most appalling service I’ve ever experienced. Flight attendants loudly bitching and whining at each other, being rude to the passengers, etc. If that’s the alternative, give me fake pleasantry any day.
I think most are not natural in announcements because most adhere closely to a script so they do not omit important information they are required to give. As a result of the repetition, their voices can become kind of sing-songy and bored-sounding.
Some may try to sound authoritative — like the school principal giving announcements — to get a modicum of more respect from passengers.
Southwest crews can be positively snarky, in the best, hilarious sense.
Southwest. They used to be much better when the staff were all drawn from the Southwest (and wore hot pants). Back in the Good old days you couldn’t get through a 30 minute flight without hearing a corny joke. And at the holidays: Christmas Carols.
I note that they work for the most successful airline, one whose business model eliminates many whine drivers (no first class, no assigned seating, no meals, limited hub services, no really long flights). I don’t think they’ve ever had layoffs either. So the theory stands.
Singapore Airlines has staff who very much represent the country’s approach to customer service – polite, yet firm. Some basic chit-chat but clearly they are there to ensure that everyone is safe and that the food is served. I don’t think anyone would accuse them of being robotic or fake.
Possibly relevant: I think they have a policy where older staff are no longer encouraged to fly.
I like the Southwest flight attendants. I always found them to be natural and plain nice.
What kind of unreasonable expectations to people have on planes these days? Asking for a blanket or beverage? Isn’t it their job to provide these things when available?
Thanks for the handoff, Tyler, my comments are posted at http://www.boardingarea.com/blogs/viewfromthewing
My bottom-line:
“[F]light attendant interaction with customers is driven more by how flight attendants feel about their company, where they are in their trip (short overnight layovers at crummy airport hotels can ruin anyone’s day!), and the fact that the interactions are repeated on a very large scale which dehumanizes the effort to some degree. Plus I get a dig in at unions for good measure, but I think union work rules are only a minor contributor (as non-union Delta has, in my experience, only moderately more personal flight attendants than say American.)”
And then of course variation is quite cross-cultural, you get more genuine (both good and bad!) interactions with Australia’s Qantas, and excellent practiced or ‘robotic’ service from the better Asian carriers, than here in the States.
I’m with scoop. I understand the robotic nature of safety announcements and the like. They follow a script and that’s it.
But the rest of the stuff, especially the pilot’s ramblings, is truly annoying. I find it paricularly irritating when, after all the preliminaries, you are finally airborne, and have settled into your reading or whatever, and two minutes later there’s another announcment. Then three minutes later there’s another one. Then another minute of silence before yet some more noise.
Can’t they just get everything out of the way at once and let the passengers suffer the flight in silence, rather than dribbling out announcements every few minutes?
Southwest! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvdCFYLf_JI
I’ve worked customer service jobs. In my experience, even when people are primarily polite and pleasant, conducting sincere, genuine social interactions with a hundred different people in an eight hour shift is unbelievably exhausting. The robotically pleasant tone was a way for me to preserve my energy by removing any actual emotions from the interaction.
I have friends who wait tables at high-end restaurants. In their eight hour shift, they encounter, max 15-20 different people. The level of service is much, much higher.
I’d expect the most genuine service from people who encounter smaller numbers of new faces every day, and who have plenty of opportunities to take breaks from talking to customers.
The last time I flew the flight attendant sounded drunk and was horribly rude. That was an American Eagle flight from DET to O’Hare. I hate flying and will drive given the opportunity.
Tyler, I think Yorkshire airlines is what you’re after: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VLYpKGVBUg
I have not noticed these problems. I fly Thromby.
DET to O’Hare drunk and was horribly rude. So they were Black Sox´s fans back from a game and were like the passengers
Here is some actual academic research on the topic: from the hotel industry,
“Using videotape scenarios in an experimental setting, this study tests the effects that scripts have on perceptions of service quality in two types of hotel service interactions—namely, a standardized encounter (in this case, check-in) and a customized encounter (i.e., concierge service). As a starting point, this study found that customers are able to detect when scripts are in use in both kinds of interactions. Moreover, the study points out the value of taking customers’ views into account when designing services. For the standardized interaction, respondents to this study reported no difference in their perceptions of service quality regardless of whether the scenario was highly scripted, moderately scripted, or relaxed (essentially, improvised). In contrast, for the concierge service, respondents perceived that a heavy use of scripting diminished service quality. At the same time, a moderate or relaxed approach to scripting for the customized concierge scenarios had no effect on respondents’ perception of service quality. This study suggests that hotel managers should be circumspect in scripting customized encounters, but may apply scripts to standardized services without diminishing perceptions of service quality.”
Read more here: http://www.hotelschool.cornell.edu/research/chr/pubs/reports/abstract-14953.html
Virgin America IMO has the most casual environment, but their on-demand beverage service is a bit chaotic and stresses out the crew.
I agree that fewer announcements would be nicer. I suspect there are some FAA mandates.
Generally I think the flight crews are pretty good. One time, though, we were delayed 2 hours on the ground. When they finally announced we were leaving, I tried to text my friend (who was picking me up) of our new arrival time. I got yelled at twice by the flight attendant who didn’t seem to care that there were people on the end of our flight who needed to be kept informed. ATer two hours, it’s not like 1 minute was going to make a difference.
I hate when they say, “We’ll be on the ground shortly.” I prefer they say, “We’ll be landing shortly.”
I have to say that the Air New Zealand flight staff are much more natural than many other airlines, and are usually genuinely friendly. They have even taken to having unconventional safety videos, which feature body painted crew.
Generally I have found Asian airlines (eg Singapore, Cathay, Thai) to have fairly robotic crew.
Any store that is narrowly focused on hobbies that are the subject of somewhat-fanatical behavior, like model trains, gaming stores or equestrian stores are probably well up there, because people who work there are often working there because they are fans, selling to fans. Even very expensive retail stores with well-paid employees will probably have a harder time producing the same genuine enthusiasm.
re: George at Sep 6, 2010 8:19:31 AM
this is in no indication of the attractiveness of their physical allure, perhaps just an adjustment to the duration of their tempests.
I work in Customer Service and I found long ago that the robotic behaviour is just a defense mechanism. I will demonstrate on this example – when speaking over the phone Agent cannot say “Please wait a second” as there are assholes who will just say “One! So you got your second and where is my solution?”. So when speaking about natural behavior, maybe 90% customers would be indifferent to it some small fraction would like it a little bit but there would be let’s say 2-5% of people who would actively use it to escalate the situation in an unpleasant way. So it is due to this kind of people you think that you are speaking to a robot.
Correction in the last sentence:Trains, not planes.
AirTran kind of copies Southwest in this respect and it kind of works – they get good ratings (relatively speaking).
I suspect natural interactions don’t make economic sense.
The problem is that while many people might prefer more natural interactions with the crew they don’t prefer it enough to change their travel plans on that basis (Do you think, ohh the people at airline X where less robotic last time I think I’ll pay $10 extra to fly them?). Basically the difference between robotic and natural falls under our radar and is quickly forgotten. On the other hand people who are offended or feel slighted by the airline employees are likely to remember their experience for a long time and make future purchasing deciscions as a result.
The upshot is the airline is motivated to minimize the probability of offense/slight not to maximize the expected value of crew interactions for the passengers. Since natural reactions inevitably increase the chance for offense/slighting it’s in the airline’s interest to encourage the robotic approach. Heck, they probably don’t even need to bother since for airline employees the cost of dealing with an offended/irate customer every so often probably far outweighs the costs of being robotic all the time.
That’s probably because they have to relay important flight info in a professional & concise manner, especially before take-off. http://www.flyercards.com
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