I found Chapter 2's discussion of narratives as an important component of communication ethics to be very interesting because I can see how important narratives are in our interactions with other people. This reflection comes from my work in customer service, where the multiplicty of narratives that I encounter during a given day can be somewhat confusing.
I work in a high volume store that caters to people across many social and economic spectrums, and very often there is conflict between customers and our workers about customers needs and how we can satisfy them while considering our stores' physical limits and need to cater to every customer in as many decisions as possible. For example, which products we stock is often a point of contention. How do you determine which products to sell when you have a finite amount of space and are getting requests to stock both high-end, high-cost items and low-end, low-cost items?
The customers requesting items are not concerned about the needs of the stores' customers collectively, but rather are caught up in their own personal needs. This just goes to show how often we allow our personal narratives to color our understanding of larger public narratives, and how it is important to improve our sense of presence by "showing up" to communication discussions as spoken about in Chapter 1. By being scrutinously present in an event as simple as requesting an item to be stocked in a store I can modify the mode of my disposition in order to be understanding that whether or not a store can succeed in indefinitely stocking the item that I request does not hinge upon the employees' willingness or lack thereof to make me happy, but rather their responsibility to make as many people as possible happy. This communication ethic exists because of the narrative of the stores' responsibility, even though it sometimes clashes with the narratives that customers bring with them.
It is very cool how you found a connection with work to the reading. Determining what products to sell, given unlimited amount of space, is an interesting decision to make. How narratives make or break the feelings of a person, related to customer service and pleasing a customer. Love the connection of communication ethics and how it can sometimes clash with a customer.
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ReplyDeleteI 110% can relate to this experience at my workplace. I work at a big box retailer in the cosmetics and personal care section. Obviously as you mentioned, space is limited and we need to cater to the needs of the most amount of people, to make the most amount of money--it's business. Many of my customers also come through requesting something that we don't sell, and I have no problem either finding them an alternative or suggesting they try a different store...sure it may be inconvenient for them and they may be disgruntled but at least we tried. The hardest part about working in cosmetics, however, is that because the store is in a predominately white neighborhood, we have almost no selection for dark complexion makeup and a very limited amount of black haircare products. It's extremely embarrassing to explain that as a representative of my store to a guest, and I share their frustration when a store that should be their friendly, local, one-stop-shop discriminates against them.
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