Up, close and impersonal

In the good old days, as my grandfather reminisced, people visited each other at the drop of a hat, on the spur. They would go from one village to another in a bullock cart, which was loaded with freshly harvested fruits and vegetables, to meet their relatives. People were welcome into the homes, anytime.

When the post cards arrived, the postman undertook the job of delivering handwritten messages to our dear ones and exchanged pleasantries with them. He was, in a way, our proxy.

With the advancement of technology to unfathomable levels, a perceptible change in lifestyle is evident. The world has shrunk, votaries of the change will vociferously claim.

Even if you are physically separated from your near and dear ones by thousands of miles, you can still talk, see each other online and use the advanced modes of commuting to meet each other in the shortest possible time, whenever required. But this has largely remained an urban phenomena and is not applicable to villages, small towns and cities.

In any given bank, not long ago, the branch manager had all the details of his customers at his fingertips. He even knew the family members of his customers. In fact, it was not uncommon for a manager to make friendly enquiries about someone’s daughter who was ill; whether their ward had secured admission in the college of their choice; if the marriage arrangements of the customer’s son or daughter was progressing satisfactorily and so on. There was warm exchanges of pleasantries and genuine concern.

With time, life has changed dramatically. Today, companies spend mind-boggling sums of money to install a ‘Customer Relationship Software’; spend hours of precious time entering all relevant data about their customers; sit and stare at the computer screen instead of talking to the same people sitting right before us, in flesh and blood.

A colleague shared his experience as a branch manager in a bank soon after the customisation of the ‘Customer Relationship Module’ in his bank.

One morning, a well-dressed young man approached the staff at the ‘May I Help you’ desk and sought contact details of the banking ombudsman. The staff member promptly directed him to the branch manager. The customer who thundered into my colleague’s cabin appeared visibly annoyed. “You sent this greeting card?” he queried.

“Yes sir, we are greeting all our customers on important occasions like their birthdays, anniversaries, etc. Hope you liked it?” my colleague asked, excitement writ large on his face.

“Liking what? Ridiculous, what sort of a database do you have? I have just stepped out of college and on the look-out for a job and you are wishing me a ‘happy and peaceful retired life’.