Dealing With Dispatch

You are probably right.
It can be hard to know which battle to pick, especially when things are usually good. I let that one go but today went after my dispatcher with operations when he refused to correct wrong customer info.
Get ready for another "long winded" video. I like to hear other people's stories. Just temperament probably, 10 minutes doesn't wear me out - and If they bore me, I can't hold it against them since they didn't intrude on me.

 

Paid by the hour! That takes a lot of angst out of the scenario.
We can easily forgive mistakes, it's the careless (immature) attitude that rankles. I try to remember how well I communicated at 23 years old and bear in mind that a 23 yr male brain is barely fully developed. The consolation of philosophy.

 

We get most frustrated when we imagine we can or should be able to control others and forget to influence them instead. Positive feedback reinforces behavior and negative feedback diminishes it. Simple but empirically true. I learned a lot about this well demonstrated principle in a previous career as a program developer working in juvenile criminal rehabilitation.

I am happy to report significant success with two previous dispatchers who weren't bad people, just immature and in need of some adult behavioral modeling and assertive (never aggressive) feedback.

Getting too aggressive or worse, mirroring the other's negativity never improves a situation (counter-aggressive is the psych term). Using principled communication strategy often does improve a situation. Maybe practical experience is the only way to convince ourselves that restraint, helpful intent and patience are most usually the most effective attitudes when confronting negativity.

 

I am finding out that the customer information and corrections I have been providing my dispatch is being ignored. Here is a specific example where dispatch is willfully sending wrong information to drivers. Incredible, but true. Anyway, this is the story and how I dealt with it.

The purpose of my "Dealing With Dispatch" videos is first, to help me think through how I deal with people who are undermining our business through lack of competence or immature behavior. Secondly, I hope others will be encouraged to be assertive in such situations by my own successes with problematic dispatchers. Enjoy

 

Well, ... how did you "deal with dispatch" on that one?

 

Are you talking specifically about failure to correct wrong customer info? If so what, in your opinion, is the reason for this absurd incompetence?

Someone is sure to tell us that we should find better employers. They are probably right but changing jobs and possibly domiciles is a pain in the a55. The irony, to me, is that I have been fairly successful in disciplining bad attitudes in dispatch but inevitably, get someone new and have to start all over again.

 

Well, it's an extra digit - an innocent mistake?
A 5pm opening time is rather unusual - what's up with that?