How Many Calls Does It Take To Get To The Center of a Tootsie Pop?

Note: I am a local technology professional blogging about how our everyday consumer activities are affected by technology. I work for the Newtown Square-based software company SAP.  Views are my own.

Remember the timeless Tootsie Pop commercial? A little boy has a problem: "How will I ever get to the gooey center of this Tootsie Pop?" He asks around, and finally the wise owl tells him he's been going about it all wrong. Licking the pop may get you there, but not very quickly. The best way to get to the core of his problem? To bite!

I can identify with what the little boy went through. In college, they used to call me "The Great Complainer." If friends had a service problem with a business, they came to me to help navigate the process. I was especially known for frequent calls to the cable company, whereby pretending to be one of my friends and demanding escalation resulted in a problem solved. I was the wise owl. The outcome: instant access to the gooey center of the Tootsie Pop (or a smaller cable bill).

These days, my "owl" approach doesn't seem to be getting me any closer to the center of the problem. As someone who works with interaction centers as part of my profession, this intrigues me...

(See the rest of this blog post here).