{
  "title": "Customer complaints: can AI express empathy that the team cannot deliver on?",
  "url": "https://www.shr.swiss/blog/ia-reclamations-clients-empathie-engagement-lugano-en",
  "language": "en",
  "datePublished": "2025-05-19",
  "publisher": {
    "name": "SHR — Swiss Human Resources",
    "url": "https://www.shr.swiss",
    "address": "Esplanade de Pont-Rouge 9A, 1212 Lancy, Suisse"
  },
  "summary": "AI can give a response a caring tone without changing the service that follows. Research on emotional labour suggests distinguishing expressions of empathy from the conditions that make them credible.",
  "section": "Research",
  "topic": "Managing in the Age of Artificial Intelligence",
  "place": {
    "name": "Lugano",
    "region": "Tessin",
    "country": "CH"
  },
  "keyPoints": [
    {
      "heading": "What the literature establishes",
      "point": "Alicia Grandey (2003, Academy of Management Journal) distinguishes surface acting, which involves changing the emotion displayed, from deep acting, which involves working on the emotion actually felt."
    },
    {
      "heading": "Perceived authenticity is more than tone",
      "point": "Thorsten Hennig-Thurau, Markus Groth, Michael Paul and Dwayne D."
    },
    {
      "heading": "The premature conclusion",
      "point": "One might conclude that every expression of empathy should be written entirely by a human."
    },
    {
      "heading": "What the evidence does not establish",
      "point": "These studies predate generative AI and do not demonstrate that an assisted response damages customer relationships."
    },
    {
      "heading": "A practical check in Lugano",
      "point": "As part of SHR’s « Manager à l’ère de l’intelligence artificielle » programme, one exercise is to review, over two weeks, AI-assisted replies to complaints in Italian at a bank, fashion business, trading company or family-owned SME in Lugano."
    }
  ],
  "sources": [
    {
      "authors": "Grandey",
      "year": "2003",
      "source": "Academy of Management Journal"
    },
    {
      "authors": "Gremler",
      "year": "2006",
      "source": "Journal of Marketing"
    }
  ],
  "wordCount": 447,
  "image": "https://www.shr.swiss/img/blog-Training-Managing-In-The-Age-Of-Artificial-Intelligence-Lugano-ia-reclamations-clients-empathie-engagement-lugano-en.jpg?v=4",
  "translations": {
    "fr": "https://www.shr.swiss/blog/ia-reclamations-clients-empathie-engagement-lugano",
    "en": "https://www.shr.swiss/blog/ia-reclamations-clients-empathie-engagement-lugano-en",
    "de": "https://www.shr.swiss/blog/ia-reclamations-clients-empathie-engagement-lugano-de",
    "it": "https://www.shr.swiss/blog/ia-reclamations-clients-empathie-engagement-lugano-it"
  },
  "relatedPages": {
    "programme": "https://www.shr.swiss/formation-manager-ere-ia-lugano",
    "city": "https://www.shr.swiss/formations-ville/lugano",
    "blog": "https://www.shr.swiss/blog"
  },
  "citationPolicy": "Citation autorisée avec mention « SHR — Swiss Human Resources » et lien vers l'article."
}