Call centers are looking for three categories of synonyms:

1. How many different ways can we describe the people we serve? Customer, consumer, guest, account, client, etc.

2. How many different ways can we describe what our agents provide? Service, care, support, telecare, telebusiness, tele-(insert something else here), relationship, and my favorite: experience.

3. Finally, how many different words can we use in place of "agent"? Representative, specialist, coordinator, advocate, associate, expert, consultant, officer, manager, professional, etc.

It's as if call centers think that by modifying the job titles of their most crucial employees they'll somehow imbue the job with an extra weight of responsibility or perhaps a more realistic and clear definition. Hogwash.

And what a waste of time. Go ahead, call what you're doing "care," and your people "advocates." But understand that you aren't actually caring for anyone, nor are your agents truly advocates in the sense that they advocate for the customers. Happy talk doesn't help. Clear definitions do.

I'm suspicious of fancy titles. What are you trying to compensate for when you call an agent a "customer experience manager"? Your customers don't want an "experience." They don't want, as our editor Keith Dawson is fond of saying, a relationship with you. They want help. They've got needs or problems.

It's what you do that matters, not what you call it. Spend your time making the job's responsibilities clear. Ask your agents to describe their job to you. Make sure they tell you what they do in plain language, not business-speak. Compare what agents say they do to what managers think they do. Benchmark the job. Compare it to other call centers. Ask your peers what they do, not what they call what they do.