“The more high technology is around us, the more the need for human touch.”
With the advancement of technology we have seen the decrease of human interaction in many businesses. As much as the technology is making certain things easier, it is separating us from having that “human touch” at times with our customers.
In my office we implemented the use of an electronic call service to remind patients of their appointment. While this is very convenient for staff personnel and saves office time, it also was upsetting to our patients who were use to a human voice with a person on the other end who they could connect with.
We did reconsider keeping the computer program versus having a staff person call, but in the end the program won due to the fact that the staff person could produce more work when they did not have to take the time to make the calls. Cost wise it just made good business sense. Sometimes you cannot argue with numbers.
Over the past year our patients have gotten use to the automated system. We also make sure that we let new patients know an automated system will be calling them with a reminder call, this way they are prepared.
Technology is great. What a business has to make sure when they embrace a new technology that will replace a human touch is that they implement better onsite customer service to make their customer forget about the non-human touch that they may encounter.
We will continue to move ahead with technology, but we must remember that there really is nothing that can replace the human touch.
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