Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Everyone should read support emails

medium.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 214 posts

Re: Everyone should read support emails

#21

Post by nostrebored »

This is one of my favorite things about Amazon's support system. Support has direct access to PMs, developers, customer facing solutions architects and all of these orgs have close connections to the customers as a result. While not everyone has access to the support cases, customer sentiment is conveyed as part of this process and features or bug fixes are quickly roadmapped as a result of customer pain.

The fact that there's someone at the other end of the support channel who actively cares and understands the problem and the customer's voice is being conveyed company wide creates a better experience for everyone.

Re: Everyone should read support emails

#23

Post by mrhappyunhappy »

taf2 wrote: post #15

I built my whole company around this idea. For years, I was the front line support - IMO, its the best thing you can do to improve not only your product but your approach to life. That and having kids.

How did having kids improve your approach to life? (This is for my own comparisons sake since having a kid also changed my life and how I think)

Re: Everyone should read support emails

#25

Post by mrhappyunhappy »

As a user experience designer the first thing I ask for is access to any and all data available, including support chat system and access to support folks so I can quickly gauge the general level of issues being experienced. It’s just one way to identify possible issues, far in advance of jumping to make any UI changes.

Re: Everyone should read support emails

#26

Post by kruczek »

scrollaway wrote: post #9

Fully agreed. I'll go a bit further: Everyone, especially engineers and PMs , should once in a while actually reply to support emails. As CTO of my previous company, I still found time for large amounts of customer support, and so did one of my cofounders. It's definitely important IMO for key people to be in contact with the userbase. Get a better look at what people are asking for, feel more directly responsible fo…

While reading the article, I got a feeling that reading support emails is only one step away from answering support emails - and here you are, suggesting just that.

I've seen further steps down this road - if there are engineers already answering support emails, then why do we need support people at all. After all, engineers have better knowledge of technical details and can make changes themselves. No need for intermediaries.

I understand the reasons for having engineers read (or maybe even sometimes answer) support emails, but still I'd be extremely wary of again working for a company that walks this path.

Re: Everyone should read support emails

#29

Post by levi-turner »

RickJWagner wrote: post #12

Support engineer here. For anyone considering a career in support: - It's harder than development. Green fields are easier. - It's pretty much a thankless job. - You are sort of the janitors of the IT world. Not much respect. + The money can be pretty good. Because of the above, management usually rewards good support engineers. + You are welcomed by those who don't want to do support. + You stay fresh, learning othe…

Very good list, although I'd disagree about pay. I'd add:

+ it's one of the easier routes to becoming a literal expert in how to deploy the software.

Re: Everyone should read support emails

#30

Post by joeblau »

At Amazon, our team did a day of shadowing tech support calls and it was extremely illuminating. You think you've designed your product to work a certain way, but your message may not be communicated very well to your customers. If it's possible, I would try to get on a support call or support a customer to gain that empathy to really understand what challenges people using your products are having.
Post reply on HN