Human Shield: Confessions of a Corporate Crash Dummy

That was me. 

You know that feeling when your body is at work, but your soul checked out weeks ago? That dead-eyed stare, the fake smile, the slow unraveling from the inside? 

That was me, too. 

I worked in customer service. Not the "smile and nod" kind. The "40 calls in 3 hours while your soul slowly evaporates" kind. 

The kind where you're not a person—you're a human shield for corporate screw-ups. Emotional crash dummies—paid to absorb the impact of every corporate mistake, then forced to smile like we enjoyed it. The Slow Unraveling They called it "the grind." We called it survival

Our team was bleeding people. Employees quit faster than they could hire replacements. The workload piled up like dirty laundry, and we were the ones expected to fold it—while still wearing it and smile about it.

So I dragged myself back. Head pounding, eyes burning from screen fatigue.

I had to call and say, "Uh... stop everything. We messed up."

The man's voice wasn't just angry—it was white-hot, the kind of rage that makes your palms sweat through the headset. "You incompetent fucks! I burned a vacation day for this!"

I could see him even through the phone: jaw clenched, face red, gripping his steering wheel like he wanted to rip it off. The script in front of me blurred.

And I had to sit there, taking it, while my nails dug half-moons into my own thighs.

Part of me understood—this screwed his whole week. But the other part? The part that hadn't slept in days? That part wanted to scream back:

'You think I wanted this? 

You think I enjoy being the human punching bag for some office drone who can't use a fucking calendar?'

But I couldn’t.

In customer service, the rulebook might as well be tattooed on your soul:

 'Apologize. Fix it. Never snap.' 

So I swallowed the acid rising in my throat and said—again—'I'm so sorry, sir.'

Corporate Rule #1: The customer is always right.

Reality: The customer is always furious, and you're always wrong.

The Breaking Point

I didn't go to the manager's office - I stormed it. My hands were shaking. Not from fear—from adrenaline. "Why the hell am I getting death threats for their mistake?"

He opened his mouth to spit some corporate script, but I locked eyes with him and hissed, "No. You look at me while I tell you how today went. You look at the person you threw to the wolves."

For one second—just one—he flinched. And I knew: he saw it. The fury. The brokenness. The human behind the headset.

Silence. Then—a write-up the next day. For "unprofessionalism."

As if professionalism meant accepting abuse as a job requirement.

But you know what? It was worth it.

Because for the first time, someone listened. My manager actually took it upstairs. Slowly, things changed. More staff. Better systems. Fewer "clean up their mess" disasters.

If companies truly care about customer experience, they’ll start by protecting the humans who deliver it.

• Real Accountability: Leadership must take direct responsibility for organizational errors rather than allowing frontline workers to absorb blame. This means clear internal accountability systems that do not push fallout onto the lowest-paid workers.
  
• Emotional Support Systems: Regular access to mental health resources, structured decompression time after intense interactions, and empathetic leadership training can reduce burnout.
• Employee Empowerment: Frontline workers should be granted real input into policies that affect their roles. Their feedback, especially during crisis response, should be treated as critical data—not complaints.
• Clear Boundaries Around Abuse: Companies must implement and enforce policies that protect employees from verbal abuse, including the right to disengage from hostile customers with full managerial backing.
• Shift in Corporate Culture: Organizations need to stop romanticizing resilience and instead prioritize sustainability—recognizing that support, not sacrifice, leads to long-term employee retention and well-being.