Defusing the Bomb

Sometimes the most ugly part of a person will come out when they are frustrated. Conversing with a user will have no filters or guaranteed politeness. And each frustrated user is frustrated for these three main reasons: they have tried everything to make the product work as they envisioned it working, they have not gotten theirs issue resolved to their satisfaction, or they may simply not agree with how their issue is being addressed. Each of these reasons have everything to do with the expectations that are set in the beginning of the conversation. From the moment their question is submitted the time limit gets closer to expiration. Its almost as if you play the role of diffusing their bomb.

In this section we will go over a few techniques that can help stay within that time limit and how to stay in control of the situation.

Get to the root of the question right away

What is it that the user is asking? What is the hidden question? If it is confusing please clarify their question and make sure they know you understand what they are saying. This understanding will save alot of unnecessary questions and troubleshooting.

Setting the expectations

Setting the expectations early will create a better understanding of a your accountability of the situation. For example, as a volunteer you are not getting paid to help these users however as a volunteer in this forum, you hold the steering wheel for the conversation. Whether or not a user agrees with you, you are the one with the knowledge that they do not have. And you are the expert.

Actively Empathize

An irate customer wants to know that they are heard and are in good hands. Reassuring them helps soften the blow and leads them back to actually actively looking for a solution to what made him or her angry in the first place. However even if as a contributor that you are not having the same issue, being able to recognize the severity of the frustration from the user’s standpoint and actively communicating that let’s the user know he or she is in good hands. And remember t go back and check your response if you have time, more cases are solved with a little more attention.

Going the extra mile

Offer a possible solution to the issue if you have a hunch as to what the issue may be at the beginning, or when you are closer to a solution offering a possible solution may sound better than not fixing the problem at all. Do not take it personally

"The crisis of yesterday is the joke of tomorrow." - H G Wells

The best part of helping an angry or frustrated user is exceeding their expectations, and having them leave with a better picture of the product than they had at the beginning of their support experience.

Adaptable helpfulness

Each thread is a unique challenge. And its variety will depend on the customer: their Tone, their problem, their technology and their skills level. Being able to adapt to their situation will bridge any gaps in technical communication and make you sound much more personable.

For example, talking to a grandmother whom is technologically inexperienced about how to change an about:config entry in Firefox is much more complicated than asking them to reset their configuration all together. One requires research and technical troubleshooting experience and the other is just pressing a button.

What if they are already angry?

Tips:

• Stay calm
• Actively listen, and do not be afraid to paraphrase or repeat what they said in their question.
• Patience management, do not be afraid to take a break. The best ideas have been made outside.
• Remain professional and objective
• Stay focused and on topic. If the conversation drifts away from anything other than support, reel it back in.

Why are they angry? or are they just angry? <insert image> Don’t feed the fire, and please avoid the smoke, you’ll suffocate

Scenario 1: A User is angry that something is not working

Response example:

"I appreciate your frustration, so I'm going to try my best to help you." + a comprehensive answer of a couple of options, explaining what the cause would be to need performance of them” as well as requesting specific information with a brief explanation as to why this information is needed to help solve their problem.

Anyone can get frustrated, and sometimes taking a deep breath and rolling up the sleeves at a later date may be necessary. Don't feed the fire, if you are frustrated too come back later.

Scenario 2: A user is angry at Mozilla because it's not working

Response example: "I understand that this is frustrating, however our goal here is to make the web open and usable by all users, not to frustrate them. I would be happy to help to continue troubleshooting your issue here so that does not happen. However we may be at a impass otherwise, so I would be happy to flag a Mozilla staff member or an engineer with a little more expertise in how to address this issue."

Then excalate or get the attention of a moderator.

Sometime a little more care is needed and it'd often be a good idea to get someone with more experience, in the case of the forum, a moderator, involved, so that they can mediate any situation and keep tab on it

They may already be having a bad day, so don’t blame yourself.

How not to get into arguments with users.

Example: When they insult you or Mozilla and you feel like you have to defend yourself.

Tips: Don’t be offended and try to see the underlying message. Peel off the emotion and get to the real message.

Some examples:

Example 1: Say you are troubleshooting for a user and they respond with a questions about why Mozilla made a change about a specific feature. If they insult you, there are ways to avoid retaliation. Options: It possible to ask the user once about the product and remind them of the troubleshooting steps you offered as a work around. And its possible to point the user to input and let them know that is the place for expressing opinions about certain features and developer changes. From there, unless they want to work with you, sometimes they were not looking for help, but just to complain.

Example 2: Another example is when a user uses CAPITAL LETTERS. “I ALREADY TRIED SAFE MODE, ITS NOT MAKING A DIFFERENCE ”

Stay calm, and do your best to address the frustration.

“Sir, I understand the frustration, we use safe mode to eliminate any factors that may be attributing to the issue. There may be several steps we take to find a solution to this issue. Since it is happening in safe mode, we now know its not one of your addons. …” One last example, where the conversation becomes abusive:

“I have tried everything in the Cannot Download or Save Files article so please don't post a link to that. Nothing worked, not even a reset. I would try scanning my computer for malware, but I CAN'T DOWNLOAD ANYTHING. I'm pretty sure this is a problem with Firefox since I am able to download and save files in Safari”

Empathy

Another tool we can use to regain the back the user to solving the question is to empathize, Please do not mistake this for sympathy.

What is the difference? Empathy is sympathy with out fault. It is putiting yourself in the users mind and try to understand how they are feeling sympathy, “I am sorry, but I cannot imaging feeling that way” there is a separation Sympathy they cannot feel what you feel. They do not know why you are technically challenged. Empathy they can feel the same way and they were technically challenged like you at one point.

For example, say you read a question like this: “I have tried everything your forum has suggested doing: Resetting Firefox, Reintalling, Turnig off Hardware acceleration. I just do not know what is causing these pop ups!”

• Sympathy: “That sucks! I am glad its not me, my pop up is working I tested it and it works just fine. You may have malware. ”
• Empathy: “If I was in your shoes I would not know what to do either. Luckily though there is a feature in Firefox that controls a list of pop ups. If that is checked it may be something beyond Firefox, have you tried a Malware Scan...”

Notice the difference there?

For Contributors Participating in the Contributor Quality Training please click here for Chapter 9