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Smoke and mirrors - oy


Posted: May 19, 2012

I've been thinking about all this. I made my living and loved my job for almost 30 years until the last few years with the voice recognition and all the electronic tedious convoluted corporate  bullcrap and severely diminished pay checks.  I have some experience with some different companies, and though I am barely staying afloat at Nuance since I escaped MQ (now MModal), here is what I believe to be true across the board.

They want more work and perfect work for less pay.  They create a diversion to make you think you are solely responsible for the accuracy of the reports. What they tell you about your line counts, whatever little tricks they try to appease you with to improve your lines and pay, they are simply blowing the proverbial smoke, to make you think you have some control over your fate.  It's a trick.  What we all know, but what they fail to acknowledge, is that machines do not do the dictating. If machines did the dictating everything could be measured out and controlled electronically quite simply.  But the dictators are human beings and this is what I find to be true:  You can only work as fast as the dictator speaks, period.  None of the electronic enhancements help when you are sitting there waiting for a dictator to chat with a co-worker or wake up since he/she just dozed off for a moment, or you cannot understand and must listen over and over to make sure it is correct because you are solely responsible for the perfection of the report.....

Also, no one tells the dictators how to do their part to help this whole electronic fiasco.  The dictators could give complete physician names so you could actually find one when you look it up instead of  finding 4 Dr. Smiths and leaving a blank because it is unclear which one after you spent valuable time trying to determine which one. and the human dictator is not aware that you are in another state and not famiiliar with "Dr. Annie."  And they could attempt to just speak more clearly. The speech recognition seems to do pretty well on the dictators who speak reasonably clearly.  But it is obvious to me that the dictators are blissfully unaware of what happens with their dictation.  They need a little cartoon film entitled "What happens after you dictated your report" and it should be mandatory for all to see so they could be more aware of how they could assist in providing a better product for all concerned.....If I dictated a report and my name was going to be on it, I would make an effort to assist somone to get it right. I personally would be happy to sign my name to each report because I do each to the very best of my ability and understanding. But, again, I am a human being, so not pefect.

The responsibility for perfection needs to be shared more equally with the company and the dictators and not completely on the shoulders of the MT.  Employees with a large responsibility for their jobs are usually paid commensurate with that responsibility. They pay MTs pennies, and if there is any problem, it is never the company or the dictator, it is always the MT who is responsible and suffers.

We are being duped.  That is my 2 cents worth...

 

 

 

 

 

Very well stated! - BadNana

[ In Reply To ..]
This is so obvious to us, all the responsibility is on us to produce a coherent report and not on the person dictating. When they mumble a patient or physican's name, no help with spelling or any helpful info, it now becomes our big challenge to solve the mystery! Getting paid pennies to make the magic happen. I am so disgusted with it all.

They also get away with this nonsense by - trying to keep us SM

[ In Reply To ..]
isolated from each other. How many times have you heard "everyone else is doing fine, it must be you" or something like that. Such a big lie and it keeps working because we are between a rock and a hard place. IMO, all teammates on an account should be able to email/IM each other. They are so afraid we will compare stories, which we do here anyway. They really have nothing to be afraid of as it won't go farther than us stomping our feet and saying it's not fair. Until we all get to the point where the indignities get to be too much to tolerate and we all refuse to work this way, nothing will change. As I said, rock and hard place, right? One income families (yours) and children you have to support, who can afford to take a stand? They are so clever and we have allowed ourselves to be victims. At least some have now taken a stand and I applaud their courage for doing so. Remember, if the companies could do offshoring and VR without us, they would have done so already. They hate it but they do need us so don't ever let that threat frighten you,it is an empty one.

Very true - Nuance MT

[ In Reply To ..]
I like the idea of the cartoon "What happens after you dictated your report," but that is exactly what the MTSO doesn't want the doctors to know. Many of them are using back-end VR and the dictators have no clue that it is being used. The MTSOs are still charging them the same rate as they charge for straight transcription and pocketing the difference between that and the "VR rate" they are paying us.


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