Who we are online
We are very online. It’s where we shop. It’s how we apply for jobs. It’s pretty much the only way we date.
As a result, we’ve gotten very good at managing the demand on our time that comes with the increased access we now have to one another.
But it hasn’t made us better people.
In fact, the habits that make you a smooth operator within the confines of your inbox are probably already seeping into communications with people you care about. You’re hopefully not yet ignoring someone on the street the way you’re letting their email languish, but the pandemic has made weird social creatures of us all.
Conversations have always been hard, but with the amount of effort it takes to close an app, we can now opt out of a relationship, and it’s time to bring a little etiquette back to the wild wild web.
Call me old fashioned, and there are some obvious spam and sales calls that this doesn’t apply to, but if someone reaches out to you personally, I say you owe them a reply.
Even if it’s just to say “thanks, but no thanks,” a polite response, no matter how many texts or emails it’s on top of, doesn’t take all that much, and it keeps the other party moving as well. There’s no wondering how busy you are or if you’re upset with them or if those wires somehow got crossed and sent your message to a different John Smith.
I think that’s what we’re all looking for. An honest reply. Whether it’s a question posed to a partner or someone you’re reaching out to with fingers crossed.
It can be hard, but also simple, and it’s what we’d want if we were on the other side of the computer.