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ABSTRACT
This study had two main purposes: to analyze the oral expressivity, the linguistics and discoursive
resources used by teleoperators; and to verify how this oral communication resources were
related to professional performance and to the attitudinal sensation caused in listeners, probable
clients. By understanding teleoperators´ oral communication we intend to contribute to Speech-
Language Pathologists, Linguistics and professionals who deal with telemarketing, specially
managers, supervisors and call center monitors. The contribution hoped is to enlarge the support
to the teleoperator and to keep the search about efficient ways to help their employee to improve
his performance, pointing to his best. Oral communication is socially built; therefore there are
stereotypes and expectations about the communicative stiles used to telemarketing professional
set. Based on this expectations the listeners/clients create an impression about these
teleoperators, during theirs relationship. These listeners/clients feel teleoperator´s sensations and
especially their attitude, making a judgment based on the caused impressions and inferences. To
understand the impact of the oral communication in the client’s deal, we searched for theorical
presupposed in Linguistics, specificatively the scientists who studied language and work
relationship, and also in the Theories of Politeness, and in Conversational-Maxim and
Management of Face. To understand oral expressivity, we assumed that this came from
dynamics sets and vocal quality used by teleoperators consciously or not-consciously. These sets
are perceived by theirs listeners/clients. This process in telemarketing, by the symbolic content of
voice, excites judgments of acceptance or rejection to the treatment given that could interfere in
the relationship established. To this research a receptive call center from São Paulo city was
chosen. Intending to verify the natural set of oral communication, with minimum interference as
possible, the call center had to fit the following criteria: the supervisor team and teleoperators
must never had former orientation about oral communication, there was no strict script to treat
client, and there must be a monitorship system of performance’s evaluation, however this
monitoring must not go deep into oral communication orientation. Across the results of technical
monitoring evaluation, two teleoperators were elected, being judged as constant technical
performance in the three months before this intervention. The first one (OP_01) had a standard
technical performance and the second (OP_02) one had a lower technical performance. An entire
client’s relationship (telephone call) was chosen of each one of this two operators, they were
similar in time duration and client request. These two recorded telephone calls were submitted to
linguistics-discursive resources analysis (statement evaluation), vocal expressivity (perceptual
analysis done by three SLP-judgers, vocal dynamic was marked sentence to sentence and
acoustical analysis of sentences with the same discoursive context), and judgment of the
attitudinal sensation caused in the probable clients of this call center (125 listeners from São
Paulo city, lately analyzed by sex, education level and age). The obtained results showed that the
linguistics and discursive resources used by the OP_01 are the damage face-threatening acts to
the own face and to the client, negatives conversational-maxims, and the oral expressivity is
characterized by strain vocal quality, narrow fundamental frequency extension with occurrent
linear prosodic curve or linear/falling prosodic curve during statements, less frequent
proeminences by rising loudness or pitch, less frequent pauses. The OP_02 uses the
conversational-maxims to minimized the face-threatening acts and protect the own faces and to
the client, and the oral expressivity is characterized by neutral voice quality, wide fundamental
frequency extension, frequent proeminences by rising pitch or vowel extention, a rising prosodic
curve or rising/falling prosodic curve during sentences, more frequent pauses. The OP_01 was
rejected by 93,6% of the probable clients mostly by the negative attitudinal sensation caused by
her oral expressivity, while the OP_02 was accepted of the probable clients mostly by the
positive attitudinal sensation caused by her linguistics and discoursive resources. The obtained
results showed that the teleoperator’s performance, were linked to the oral communication, being
the teleoperator evaluated by SLPs, or by the company, or even by clients. The most qualified
professional are the teleoperators that use specifics vocal quality and dynamics sets to compose
their oral expressivity and specifics linguistic-discoursive choices.