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When Silence Speaks in the Contact Center

Contributed article by Jochen van der Veer, CEO, TheyDo  

What the Gen-Z “stare” really is—and why it matters 

The “Gen-Z stare” went viral as a blank, extended pause in everyday interactions. In a contact center, that same moment shows up as hesitation you can measure: dead air on a voice call, a no-input in IVR, a chat that stalls or abandons after the first bot turn. If we treat it as ‘attitude,’ we escalate. If we treat it as ‘data,’ we can find the broken step, such as unclear options, awkward wording, and a missing path, and fix it where it starts. 

Through my work with contact-center leaders mapping and improving customer journeys, I’ve seen that the early seconds of an interaction are where outcomes are won or lost. A single broken step can quietly multiply costs across millions of contacts. 

By reading hesitation in the signals you already have, such as talk-ratio, sentiment by topic, and first-turn abandonment, and then making small edits to prompts and handoffs, you can move those outcomes measurably. 

Why hesitation concentrates at the start  

The first turn is where customers decide whether you understand their intent. If the opener is vague; say “how can I help?”, or an IVR offers a wall of similar choices, people hesitate. 

That hesitation looks different by channel. In voice, transcripts reveal monologues or interruptions that mask uncertainty. In IVR, ‘no-input’ or immediate ‘escape to agent’ tells you the options don’t match the customer’s intent. In chat, a long typing delay or first-turn abandon often means the bot asked for free text when the customer expected buttoned choices. 

Sentiment analysis adds another layer. Negative or uncertain tone clustered around status, identity verification (ID&V), billing, coverage/entitlements, or renewal/upgrade, usually points to a language problem, not a customer one. 

If your speech-to-text export includes timestamps, you can even track pause length; it’s helpful, but not essential, to see the pattern. The key point is that hesitation tends to concentrate early, which makes it localizable and fixable without a big transformation program. 

From insight to change 

Improving early-turn outcomes is less about new dashboards and more about editing. Tag a seven-day slice of interactions for first-turn signals: talk-ratio outliers in voice, IVR no-inputs on the opener, chat abandons after the first bot message, and sentiment by topic. Then change the language or path at the specific step you flagged and give agents one short line that acknowledges thinking time. Ship the change for a week and compare like-for-like. This loop is deliberately small because it must be repeatable: instrument → edit → observe → keep what works. 

Teams that run this cadence consistently build a library of prompt and policy fixes that reduce avoidable contacts without heavy lift. Inside journey frameworks, where those changes are tracked step by step, the effect compounds over time. 

Example: from fragmented journeys to measurable results   

A European bank found that fragmented journeys that affected five million customers were leading to outsized costs. 29% of customers experienced issues when trying to resolve a specific problem, leading to 48,000 additional support calls a month and over €1.3M annually in extra handling costs. 

The fix was both organizational and linguistic: the bank connected insights across siloed teams, aligned on a shared roadmap, and prioritized fixes by value and feasibility. A single broken step in the flow—an unclear IVR prompt—was rewritten, rerouted, and measured. 

The result? Fewer avoidable contacts, shorter handle times, and higher sentiment. The lesson for contact centers is that early-turn clarity and clean handoffs make a visible difference. 

Four rewrites that reduce early-turn hesitation 

Here are some illustrative patterns you can adapt to your house style. 

Status ambiguity in IVR

Before: “Please tell me how I can help you.”

After: “I can give you claim status or policy details. Say ‘status’ or ‘policy,’ or press 1 for status, 2 for policy. You can say ‘agent’ any time.” 

ID&V in chat

Before: “What’s your policy number?”

After: “I have two quick ways to verify you: policy number or DOB plus ZIP. Which is easier for you?” 

Billing dispute with an agent

Before: “That charge looks correct on my end.”

After: “Let’s check the last two charges together. If anything seems incorrect, I can credit or escalate while you’re here.” 

Channel mismatch at handoff

Before: “You’ll need to call back to complete this.”

After: “I can text a secure link so you can complete this or connect you to a specialist. Which works best?” 

Coaching for the pause 

Silence is a diagnostic moment. Recognize it fast, simplify the next step, and reopen the conversation. Acknowledge the pause and narrow the choice. For example, “I’ll give you a moment — would you like Option A or Option B?” or “Not sure which path to choose? I can text a quick summary or walk it through now.” In other words, keep momentum without pressure. Use these techniques selectively, then watch talk-ratio, abandon, and sentiment on the same topics that triggered the stall. 

What to track each week 

• Talk-ratio distribution on voice, especially agent >80% in the first minute
• Sentiment by topic in the first turn (ID&V, status, billing, coverage, renewal)
• IVR no-input on the first two prompts and escape-to-agent after the opener
• Chat first-turn abandon and initial response latency
• Escalation and repeat-contact rates on the same topics
• AHT and FCR as balancing metrics
• (If timestamps are available) Pause length in the first turn  

Itching to start? Next week, try this. 

Pull seven days of transcripts and chats and tag the first turn for the signals above. Pick one hot spot. Edit the step, add a human escape hatch, and give agents a single pause-friendly line. Ship for a week and compare against the same period. Keep the winner and move to the next step. 

Key takeaway 

The “Gen Z stare” is a cultural label; hesitation in the first turn is your operational signal. When those moments spike, something in the journey is broken. Instrument the start, edit the step — not the person — and you’ll see the difference in contacts avoided, resolution speed, and customer sentiment. 

Author bio 

Jochem van der Veer is the co-founder and CEO of TheyDo, an intuitive journey management platform. A designer by trade, he has nearly a decade’s experience in UX consultancy. Jochem founded TheyDo in 2019 to help businesses truly become customer-centric by organizing around the customer journey.