“Can you text that to me?” The Lost Art of Talking on the Phone

“Can you text that to me?”  The Lost Art of Talking on the Phone

This post is not intended to be a philosophical “groundbreaker,” rather more of a rant about a trend I notice in society today.  The days of paying a $.10 charge per text message to cell phone carriers are long behind us.  Nowadays texting is unlimited and instant message services like Facebook and Twitter are at our disposal 24/7.  This makes it more convenient for people to communicate via text versus talk on the phone.  Driving directions, addresses, phone numbers, you name it… Instead of engaging in vocal conversations that require us to use our brain we simply ask, “Can you text that to me?”

When we are forced to talk on the phone, it is obvious our skills are lacking.  From language barriers and intelligence gaps to absurd rates of speech and external distractions, there are dozens of reasons why it is hard to have a clear phone conversation with someone you don’t know.  Just the other week I asked a lady for someone’s email address over the phone and she read it back to me faster than Usain Bolt runs the 100!  After recording one letter I had to ask her to slow down and repeat for me.   This causes me to ask a few questions:  How do poor communicators end up in customer-facing jobs?  Who gives them feedback so they can improve?  Is there any training out there to help improve poor phone etiquette?  If society continues to embrace a “text over talk” mentality, the youth of tomorrow may not have any verbal phone communication skills. 

I have worked on several projects as a consultant in the past few months where it has been essential to not only talk on the phone but also take accurate notes for future reference.  As a consultant I am rarely in a position to ask a client or employee at another business to text me information because that could portray laziness and unprofessionalism.  I take special care when writing down email addresses and numbers because return calls due to inaccuracy cost time and money.  The fact is unless I’m talking to my Wife I don’t usually say, “Can you text that to me?”  Sorry Honey.  My point is there are situations where you cannot simply default to requesting a spoon-fed text message.

We do almost everything possible nowadays to prevent speaking on the phone.  We would rather Google someone or search several websites before picking up the phone to ask a real person a question.  We would rather open Google Maps to find out where we are going than ask the local standing right in front of us.  Ask anyone age 30 or younger-One of the things they hate the most in business and in their personal lives is listening to voicemail.  Why the heck did that lady have to leave me a 3 minute message when she could have just texted me, “Your teeth cleaning appointment is next Tuesday at 9am.” 

Are text messages all bad?  Of course not.  There are some great benefits to sending precise information quickly without any misinterpretation.  However, if we rely solely on this practice as a society we will begin to forget the joys of talking out loud to real people.  We will lose the skill of taking notes in real time.  We will become DUMBER.  Quicker isn't always better.