Using an Easy Bake Oven to cook the Thanksgiving Turkey

By Garry Schultz
Expecting Social Media channels to serve up bona fide truth is like using an Easy Bake Oven to cook the Thanksgiving Turkey. The result may not be what was hoped for.

Close neighbors just held an election where Truth took a severe beating & was left, bloodied, in the gutter. Facebook users are mortified that much of the FB content is, gasp, not validated. In fact, it’s often fiction dressed up as Truth and, often, specifically designed to mislead. Journalist Tom Spears writes “Medical Journals Publishes Fake Research for Cash”. Fake medical research for profit! And, consider the outcry over the standard practice of media astroturfing!

Who will think of the children (thank you, Mrs. Lovejoy)? Who can be trusted?

Research shows we become accustomed to dishonesty the more we exercise the dishonesty-muscle. The brain adapts to dishonesty! Arrrrg, we become better liars & more susceptible, more receptive, to lying as we practice. We are building a generation of cynics. We need to start working on building a generation of informed skeptics. Critical thinking is on its last legs.

The real concern is if the dynamic is reversible. Maybe, if we stopped exercising the muscle, it would atrophy & truth would again reign. And maybe I am just an optimist.

Why did I post this on LinkedIn? Fair question, well… I wonder how much the contact center industry may have contributed to exercising the dishonesty-muscle. Not suggesting that contact center personnel are dishonest but the fact is many consumers perceive that the contact center industry is founded on dishonesty. Catbert riffs on the theme frequently. As an industry we need to change that perception; contact centers are there to help. How did the contact center community end up on the negative side of honesty?

Action – Please share ideas, your industry is in the gutter, bloodied….

Enjoy Thanksgiving –

No disrespect to Hasbro’s excellent Easy Bake Oven – I have been the recipient of many delightful bite size cakes in my time.