“You have a reassuring phrasing, the anger that I felt rising in the client was quickly defused. This Thursday morning, the telephone advisers of the EDF customer relations center in Nantes are not evaluated by their manager but by volunteers from the association. Valentin Hauy.
For three days, these ten blind or visually impaired people, “gifted with a hearing sense well above average”, assisted them at their post to “better capture and translate beyond words the emotions of customers on the phone. “An “unprecedented” operation for both parties, who speak of a give-and-take approach.
“Beyond improving the listening quality of our advisers, who can sometimes be too busy with their computer, the objective is to create links, to live a human experience, explains Sébastien Louis, manager of this center which employs about sixty people. For the association’s volunteers, these are three days of inclusion in the business world. »
“Simplify communication”
In a part of the open space, where the lighting had to be readjusted, Samuel takes notes in his digital Braille notebook. Wearing headphones, this blind man concentrates on the conversation led by Orlane, his colleague for a day, sitting right next to him. As soon as the latter hangs up, place a debrief of a few minutes, before a new call. “Thanks to him, I realized that I was using too many ‘internal’ terms, which can confuse customers,” admits the young woman. You have to be very careful to simplify communication as much as possible. »
A little further on, on another desk, we wonder. Was Laetitia right to advise her interlocutor “to carry out her procedure on the Internet”, because “it’s easier”? “You always have to try to put yourself in the place of the person on the line, says Emmanuel, who has been blind for a dozen years. She may be visually impaired, in difficulty or elderly…”
A “very rewarding” experience
In 2020, a similar initiative took place at the EDF customer relations center in Angoulême. For eighteen months, volunteers from the same association worked half a day a month with advisers to make them aware of the importance of silences, of a changing intonation, or of a speaking rate that accelerated. “Feedback has been very positive, with double-digit growth in customer satisfaction indicators,” reports Sébastien Louis.
“It’s an exciting and very rewarding experience for our beneficiaries, whose employment rate is very low due to difficulties in accessing software, or the lack of suitable means of transport, says Martine Routon, departmental president of the association Valentin Haüy. Our goal is to raise awareness of the limits of blind people or visually impaired, on their needs, but also on their abilities”.