Recently I was very fortunate to have Elizabeth Stokoe as a guest on the Engage Business Media podcast Customer Engagement – Examples of Excellence. Liz is Professor and Academic Director of Impact at the LSE and an acknowledged expert on conversation analysis. She is the author of “Talk” and has spent much of her professional career helping organisations to understand the mechanics and science of conversation and the immense power that the ‘right’ words and phrases can have.
While we’re frequently told that actions speak louder than words, we can’t ignore the value and impact that positive conversations have on our interactions, especially those involving customer service. As Liz pointed out in our podcast and in her book, actions do not speak louder than words. Words are actions. No talk is small; talk does big things.
Perhaps Network Rail had this in mind when they introduced a booklet called “Speaking Passenger”. Unfortunately, as history has shown us, they are all talk and no action. This “initiative” was recently reported in The Times and noted that Network Rail has banned the staff from referring to passengers as passengers. The article notes that, “according to 134 pages of guidance (only a train company would need to have that much verbiage) issued to staff by the company, the word has become ‘too formal’. It lists formal words to avoid such as ‘passengers’, ‘purchase’, ‘onboarding’ and the phrase ‘rest assured’. Perhaps they should also consider banning that truly appalling and lame phrase, ‘see it, say it, sorted’.
It goes on to say that “Network Rail hopes that the use of more ‘everyday language’ will reduce the frustrations that customers feel when journeys are disrupted or delayed – 370,000 trains were cancelled or part-cancelled last year”
As a nation, the precipitous and continual decline in customer service reflected in air travel screwups, financial service system failures, water company supply disasters and myriad other business missteps, means we are faced with these disruptions on an increasingly regular basis. However, they are not yet daily occurrences compared with the crap shoot that commuters face every day not knowing whether their train will be delayed or cancelled.
We’ve become used to weasel words and empty platitudes from the rail industry, especially from the ironically and perversely named, Rail Delivery Group, who have delivered nothing but dividends for the train company shareholders and misery for passengers (I don’t know if they have banned the word yet, but it’s clear that they care little for the travelling public regardless of the word they use). No amount of semantic gymnastics will ease the tension and reduce the mental and financial pain that are often the result of missed appointments, late meetings and rescheduled travel, regardless of the Delay and Repay schemes that are often too complex and time consuming for many to bother with. Which of course the train companies have designed and count on to stem the loss of revenue from their laziness and incompetence. Even if you have the time on your delayed journey, the lack of Wi-Fi on the train, or a seat to complete the transaction comfortably, another daily occurrence, will make that impossible.
We wait, more in hope that anticipation, to see if Great British Railways, the publicly owned body that will be the long-term replacement for the previous privatised rail franchising system will bring any positive changes. In the meantime, and with the knowledge that the rail industry is actually run (into the ground) by the unions perhaps they will adopt an equally passive tone to justify their increasingly militant and customer service adverse actions, and we might soon be getting something like this.
‘Driver Smith has politely declined an invitation to join his train at the depot due to a slight cold and therefore we must regretfully withdraw this train from service and leave you to wait in vain on the platform with your fellow non-passengers for another hour. We hope that our pleasant tone will reduce your anger and mitigate the fact that once again you will be late for dinner and not be able to see your children before bedtime’.
As with the water companies, the historical lack of infrastructure investment in points, signalling, and track has been a major impediment to any improvement, and this is the reason that Network Rail is hoping to distract us with this pathetic exercise in self-promotion. With Peter Hendy, former Network Rail chairman, taking a role as a minister of state in the Department for Transport( DfT) his ‘track’ record is not going to inspire confidence that it will ‘signal’ positive changes any time soon. With the “black hole” in the country’s finances to fall back on, it’s likely that the only thing to run on time will be the DfT press releases, which regardless of the ‘warmer’, ‘shorter’ and ‘clearer language’ that Network Rail promises to use, won’t include the words and language that most of us use when once again there is ‘points or signal failure’, to delay our journey.
However, there is one word change that reflects the current state of our rail industry and can be achieved with a single letter.
Notwork Rail anyone?