[Trasmatta]

> Working support must suck, but being first line support in a call center truly sounds like hell

I've worked support, it truly is hell. I reserve most of my empathy for the front line support staff. When things are shit, it's almost never the first line support staff's fault, so it's not fair to take my frustrations out on them.

[touisteur]

I worked as 'the software guy' on a big customer infra project where I'd be 1/4th of my time on customer sites reproducing problems, narrowing their cause, asking users to show me how they broke it, testing exhaustively and exhaustingly new releases or quickfixes w/ specific complaining person at customers' site, writing detailed descriptions of new versions, relentlessly opening tickets as a customer advocate but also triaging my time and tickets. The rest of my time would be fixing some, pushing colleagues to fix others, documenting, reproducing, proposing changes to avoid whole classes of problems... And implementing features (either asked by customer and I had time, or new feature idea that we'd fit in customer's budget twice - once as a prototype/PoC and once as a qualified feature).

It was one of the best experiences in my life and 'software' in that system was quite the gamut. I loved over anything being the voice of the customer, bringing back some reality in an org that can be quite bureaucratic, myopic to real needs and forgetful of problems.

It also was the time I spent the most political capital and when I discovered I was appreciated but to a point and that you can be right and lose, and that some people feel the customer is 'the other team' and you play 'for them'. Quite eye opening about what happens when words (customer obsession) meet KPIs or actual incentives...

[salawat]

Welcome to office politics. Where the metrics are what matter, and getting done what you set out to do takes the back seat.

[jodrellblank]

I think companies deliberately and abusively do this, use front line support staff as human shields from their customers. This isolates the people inside from the consequences of their decisions and the front line will take the brunt of it.

[salawat]

Interestingly, I've chased down an issue before where a company was pulling back from realizing it's primary goal... Because it resulted in too many angry support calls from people who didn't understand the problem space fully.

Bit of an eye opener that.

[jfrunyon]

I've worked support, it truly isn't hell*. Show the user that you care about their issue and can help them resolve it; project confidence; empathize. That's all you have to do. Unfortunately, none of that is possible with a language and culture barrier in the way, not to mention a script or KPI's full of useless information you have to collect.

* Also unfortunately, most companies' hiring mentality for support is "warm butts in seats", and to top it off, oftentimes they prohibit their support from providing any kind of resolution to various genuine issues. In which case it definitely is hell, and the fact that people continue in these positions rather than jumping ship at the first opportunity only enables these businesses.

[Trasmatta]

> Show the user that you care about their issue and can help them resolve it; project confidence; empathize

I did all of this, was good at my job, and there wasn't a language or cultural barrier. It was still hell.

[hnzix]

It also depends if you're supporting org users or The General Public. Org user support can be quite rewarding. Dealing with the unwashed masses however...