Havas People release ‘Reminder to be Kinder’ platform
Havas People have launched a campaign in support of the mental health of customer service staff.
The announcement:
This RU OK? Day, Havas People are asking organisations to turn their ‘on hold’ experience into a storytelling channel for customer service workers to share their stories. Because it’s not okay to be called a liar, an idiot and other names not fit for print, simply for doing your job.
Customer aggression is on the rise with over 87% of retail workers saying they’ve experienced verbal abuse from a customer. It’s also a major contributing factor to poor mental health at work with 1 in 2 Australians facing workplace burnout in 2025.
For workers in customer service, their mental health is uniquely challenged by Australian companies ingesting AI into the customer service experience. Not only have their jobs been threatened or made redundant, the use of AI, in some recent cases like for a major Australian bank, has directly contributed to increase in the volume of customer calls. How many customer interactions have been positive? That’s something the numbers don’t reflect.
Havas People’s mental health campaign for customer service workers called ‘A Reminder to be Kinder’ takes a company’s on-hold air-time that’s usually reserved for elevator music or sales messages and replaces it with actual stories from the people customers might be talking to.
Leading academic and expert in Consumer Behaviour in Retail, Professor Gary Mortimer sees this as an effective strategy in reducing customer aggression because it’s ‘humanising the service interaction.’
He goes on to say, “Humanising a customer service worker is incredibly hard, because the relationship between the customer is disconnected, but the way Havas People have done this via their campaign, makes a lot of sense.”
To increase the adoption of using on hold as a channel to improve workers’ mental health, Havas People has created a free templated script for companies to use.
Creating practical tools, via a free script is something Professor Mortimer endorses, “What we’re finding in our research is that any form of self-disclosure from the customer-facing worker, humanises the individual, and the scripts that Havas People have developed is an excellent way to do that.”
Fiona Warren, business director of Havas People, APAC, says, “We launched this campaign in response to a growing crisis in workplace mental health, driven by rising customer aggression and costing the Australian economy over $39 billion in lost productivity. When employees feel supported, they are better equipped to deliver great service, which benefits both people and business. By turning on-hold time into a moment of empathy, we aim to bridge the gap between customers and the people behind the calls. It’s a simple but powerful reminder that behind every headset is a human, and that kindness can make a real difference.”
Source: Havas People
