1. A computer-implemented method for operating an interactive response system comprising: receiving data representing a multi-utterance transaction with a person, the data having multiple elements, a subset of the elements including sensitive customer data; portioning the multi-utterance transaction into discrete, logical utterance units; automatically presenting the utterance units in perceptible form through a routing device and an analyst interface to each of a number of intent analysts, the utterance units being distributed so that no intent analyst is ever exposed to more than one of said subset of the elements including sensitive customer data; accepting intent input from each intent analyst through the respective analyst user interface, where the intent input characterizes the intent analyst's interpretation of the person's intent expressed in the utterance unit; and using a processor, automatically communicating a message to the person, in perceptible form and in substantially real time relative to the receiving step, the message being automatically selected from among a predetermined set of possible messages as a function of the intent input accepted from the intent analysts.