When businesses face complaints, friction, or tough feedback, many do the same thing: they go quiet. Not because they don’t care but because silence feels safer than difficult conversations. Yet in customer care, silence is never neutral. It always communicates something. And more often than not, what it communicates is indifference. I experienced this firsthand on a recent trip from Kilimanjaro to Kigali via Nairobi. My original flight was scheduled to depart at 10 a.m., which meant being at the airport by 8 a.m. That morning started early. I was up at 5:30 a.m., preparing, packing, and ensuring I was out the door by 6:30 a.m. All of that effort was based on a promise already made by the airline. At check-in, as I tried to confirm my boarding, I received an email: the flight had been rescheduled. Instead of departing in the morning and arriving in Kigali that afternoon, the new plan would have me leave at 6 p.m., spend the night in Nairobi, and only arrive in Kigali the following morning. That was not an option. I had a business engagement at 8 a.m. the next day, the exact time I was originally meant to land. You can imagine the confusion and frustration at the airport as passengers tried to understand what was happening. When it was finally my turn to speak to the check-in officer, I asked about alternatives that would allow me to arrive the same day. There were none. I was advised to buy another ticket with a different airline, with repeated assurances both at the airport and later by teams in Kenya that the additional cost would be refunded. Trusting that guidance, I purchased the ticket. I arrived in Kenya, landed at the wrong airport, navigated my way to the correct one, queued again at the transfer desk, and requested the refund forms only to be told bluntly that there would be no refund. From that moment on, the silence began. I reached out to everyone I had dealt with. No response. The next day, already in Kigali, someone finally replied briefly telling me to contact customer care. I wrote a detailed email outlining the inconvenience, the costs incurred, and the conflicting information I had been given. And then... nothing. No response. No acknowledgment. No explanation. No apology. Just silence. And silence, in moments like this, feels louder than words. Another experience reinforced just how damaging silence can be. One day, my child came home from school with a small wound on his back. Naturally concerned, I sent a message to the school asking what had happened. There was no immediate response. One day passed. Then two. Then three. During those three days, my mind filled in the gaps. I imagined worst-case scenarios. My anxiety grew, not because of the injury itself, but because no one had acknowledged my concern. All it would have taken was a simple message: “We’ve received your concern and are investigating. We’ll get back to you.” Instead, silence allowed fear and mistrust to grow. This is the danger of the silence gap. When organizations say nothing, customers don’t hear neutrality. They hear avoidance. They hear dismissal. They hear, “You don’t matter enough for a response.” I see this gap often in the workplace too, especially in recruitment. Candidates are shortlisted, interviewed, assessed, and asked to share salary expectations. Time, energy, and hope are invested on both sides. Then, when decisions are made or budgets shift many organizations simply ghost the candidates. No closure. No feedback. No courtesy email. Yet these are people who showed interest in your brand, prepared for interviews, and gave you their time. The least they deserve is closure. Silence here doesn’t just damage employer branding it erodes basic human respect. The same happens internally. Leaders avoid difficult conversations about performance, behaviour, or expectations, hoping issues will resolve themselves. But silence does not fix problems. It only allows them to grow quietly until they become crises. If you expect change, you must be willing to address what’s not working. Silence breaks trust, damages emotional safety, and weakens culture. Why do businesses choose silence? Often, it’s fear, fear of saying the wrong thing, fear of accountability, fear of confrontation, or simply not knowing what to say. But customers are far more forgiving of honest communication than they are of being ignored. A late update is better than no update. An uncomfortable conversation is better than silence. An honest “we are investigating” is better than disappearance, because silence always tells a story and rarely a good one. Silence tells customers: “We’re overwhelmed.” Or worse: “We don’t care.” In service, communication is not only about fixing problems; it is about managing emotions. Acknowledgment buys time. Transparency builds trust. Even when you don’t yet have answers, saying something reassures the person on the other side that they have been seen and heard. The silence gap is costly. It costs trust, loyalty, reputation, and emotional safety. And once trust is broken, it is far harder and far more expensive to rebuild. So here is the reflection every leader, service provider, and organization must sit with: Where have you gone quiet instead of being clear? What conversations are you avoiding? And what story is your silence telling your customers, your employees, and your candidates? Because in customer care, saying nothing is still saying something. And often, it says everything. The author is a certified hospitality trainer and founder of Outstanding Solutions Afrika, a boutique hospitality and tourism consulting firm dedicated to transforming service excellence.
