What Makes for Effective Rent Related Communication Between Social Housing Landlords and Tenants? A Report From the ‘Holding on to Home’ Study

Over a two-year period of the Holding on to Home research project, social housing landlords and tenants have repeatedly told us that improvements in spoken communications are essential to effective tenancy sustainment. However, there is a significant gap in research that might help landlords improve their communications in this challenging, and often sensitive area with tenants. This research begins to address that gap.

We worked with two social housing landlords to collect a corpus of one hundred and forty telephone calls between call handlers and tenants where rent arrears and related matters were discussed. We used conversation analysis to examine the calls and arrive at empirically grounded insight about what makes for effective communication for tenancy sustainment. We identified three core interactional/behavioural competencies used by call handlers. These are labelled as: (i) Shouldering the burden; (ii) Together in the ‘problem space’; (iii) Non-directive solutions. When engaged in the manner outlined in the table below, these competencies typically gain commitment and/or move the interaction toward solution-focussed outcomes.

Table 1: Communicative competencies
Competency Recommendations Shouldering the burden Actively communicate to tenants what you can and will do on tenants behalf. Frame language using a basic linguistic structure of ‘I am going to do x for you’. Frame requests using a collaborative linguistic structure, prefacing the help being offered: ‘I will do x, can you do y’. Together in the ‘problem space’ Actively communicate empathy and understanding with tenants. Where appropriate, use mirroring to offer explicit demonstrations of alignment E.g. ‘I have similar experience of x and I understand the challenge’. When dealing with complex challenges, demonstrate active involvement in problem solving with the tenant. Non-directive solutions Frame requests or recommendations as suggestions rather than demands. E.g. ‘has anyone suggested that we do x?’, ‘how does x sound to you?’, ‘would you prefer x or y next step?’ When exploring a range of solutions, invite tenants to narrow in on the most sensible option via a linguistic structure that closes the agreement. E.g. ‘Would you like x to be the case?’; ‘I can organise x, would you like me to do that?’ When tenants suggest solutions that might not be feasible based on their financial or other circumstances, recommend an alternative using an either/or linguistic structure: ‘x is one option but what about y’.

Additionally, we identified a series of interactional behaviours that appear to work in opposition to the above competencies. Namely: ‘Constructing burden’, ‘Problem avoidance/ problem ambivalence’, ‘Doing to versus doing with’. When these opposing behaviours are engaged, solution-focussed outcomes are threatened, and other non-desired outcomes are invited. This includes negative impact on the emotional or psychological wellbeing of tenants, and increased call times due to call handlers and tenants becoming immersed in disagreement and/or tenants becoming frustrated and invoking other matters of complaint.

We offer recommendations that encourage landlords to undertake regular training and call review exercises with frontline staff to help develop communicative/interactional competencies in line with our findings. This requires fostering a culture of open and supportive staff development such that call handlers can actively review how these competencies take place in real time conversation, and gain opportunities to review and develop their own communicative practice.