When Loneliness Calls

If a person has a question about a purchase or a service, they usually get in touch with the contact centre of a company in question. What most people don’t know is that there is a dark side to working in those contact centres. Many people in mental distress usually call the first available number. These are mostly company contact centres, where people aren’t trained to help them. Luna \TBWA and Zavarovalnica Sava, an insurance company from Slovenia, designed the initiative ‘When Loneliness calls’. Working with professionals, they provided their employees in call centres with education on how to talk to people in mental distress. Now they are inviting other companies to join them in their cause and implement the same educational program for their employees. Every 40 seconds someone takes their own life. Slovenia is one of the leaders in suicide, since suicide claims 4 times more victims than car accidents. Before taking the final step, many of them try to seek help, but their attempts go unrecognised. By talking to contact centre employees, we realised that despite suicide prevention lines, people in mental distress usually call the first available number, which is often a number of a company’s contact centre. ‘When Loneliness calls’ is an initiative that Zavarovalnica Sava implemented to provide their employees in contact centres with the right training and knowledge for dealing with people in mental distress. A special educational program, led by coaching professionals and psychologists, was designed and is now available to any other company who wants to join this initiative and make a difference - sometimes even between life or death. David Kastelic, chairman of the board in Zavarovalnica Sava, sent a personal invitation to Slovenian companies with their own contact centres. He wrote: “An old saying goes: ‘If you save a life, you’ve saved humanity’. And we believe that we can do it together because only together we’re never truly alone.” Note: suicide is a communal problem of society. If you meet a person in mental distress, keep in mind, that sometimes just talking can be enough. Giving somebody the opportunity for an honest conversation about their pain might just be the helping hand they need.