For me an email is when I don't need a quick response. A text is when I want a faster response but I don't want to interrupt what the other person is doing. A call is when I want a quick response and I think it's worth interrupting the person.
I very rarely call.
Phone calls also assume the person on the other end wants to be bothered. If you choose to not answer, you're treated like the a-hole and are expected to explain why ("I've been trying to call you. Why haven't you picked up?")
"A telephone is a fantastically rude thing. I mean, it's like going 'speak to me now! Speak to me now! Speak to me now!'. If you went to someone's office and banged on their desk and said, 'I will make a noise until you speak to me' it would be considered unbelievably rude."
I was trying to explain to an elderly friend that people don’t just phone other people now and certainly not at times they will be doing something.
She found it hard to accept that many people find it rude to be called unannounced.
As an example, at one time if someone was organising a social event (eg party) they would phone around to invite people.
But that’s incredibly rude you are imposing on someone and also asking them to decide or excuse themselves on the spot.
I have a coworker that if you try to call her and she doesn't want to talk she straight up changes her status to away or busy and then just ignores your call. She is an a-hole but not for this reason, lol.
Phone etiquette for the 2020s:
Message:
Hi, I wanted to talk about X. I think it’ll take about 5-10 minutes. When would be a convenient time to call?
Phone calls themselves don’t annoy me. People who expect to call you at any time and then get upset you won’t drop what you’re doing to speak to them annoy me.
This makes me irrationally angry because whenever I hear this, putting the time it took to ask would have been enough time to just type up a few sentences in an email that would explain everything everyone needed to know and then we've also got it in an easily searchable format so we can reference it later if needed.
I may be a little bitter.
I greatly prefer messaging, but sometimes I call because it'll take me 5 minutes to talk on the phone and 25 minutes to get it all hashed out through texts.
Shortly after getting a cell phone, I made a personal policy that most people don't get a free pass to interrupt my life whenever they want (there are a handful of people on the short list, of course). I've had friends and family comment that I'm hard to contact by phone, and I've always pleasantly agreed (and explained politely if they seem interested). Even texts or other messages can wait until I'm at a good place to respond.
For me, having my phone on silent most of the time is a mental health thing. I know people that have their attention diverted every few minutes, and I have no idea how they survive.
Try having a brain that is compelled to actively search for new distractions, and
Squirrel!!!
My wife has ADHD. I feel you, fam.
When my dad wants to talk, he texts me something like "Hey Stephen, give me a call when you have a chance", and then I oblige when I have a chance. Most of the time it probably could have been an entirely text exchange, but whatever.
When my mom wants to talk, she just calls out of the blue, I don't answer, and usually we don't end up talking.
...I forgot where exactly I was going with this, but something about lining the call up beforehand
Yeah, at this point, it's polite to arrange a call, especially if it's probably more than a minute or two. And as you've noted, it's also more successful than a cold call.
Generally I get work emails to tell me things and work phone calls to ask me things. One twenty minute conference call could equate to about 800 emails going back and forth. (Also, some of our best staff don’t read and write (English) too well.
For me it would help if there would be an option for me to see the at least the reason why the call is being made and also an estimated time of the call.
And with work related calls, it kind of makes me insecure to not know the topic beforehand. I don't want to blob out some half information. Write it in email, I'll see for it and get back to you.
For me it would help if there would be an option for me to see the at least the reason why the call is being made and also an estimated time of the call.
There is: the person calling can first send a short text asking if they can call you to talk about ________.
I was more thinking about as something that should be baked into the "phone app" from my point of view. So when the phone rings, I'm seeing who calls, why is he calling and what amount of time would he need. If I'm missing the call, I would also see these info in the recent calls.
I think context makes a difference on whether a call is welcome or not, appropriate or not.
If the email asks me to write out a bunch of info I know off the top of my head, just call me. Don't make me write out something that I can just tell you much faster.
If you're asking something that kicks off a conversation going back and forth like if you need help walking through something, sending emails back and forth is annoying and dumb. Knocking it out in one call is faster and easier than exchanging 15 emails.
On the other hand, if you don't need an answer right away, if you need documents or images or if you need to communicate about something that requires a record of the communication, email is better.
I have been annoyed equally by getting calls and emails when people use them for things when they aren't ideal.
I can see both points. In my experience, people misuse calls more often, since a work-related call would often require a follow-up email anyway, but that's more anecdotal evidence
I’m so glad that spam calls aren’t a thing where I live yet. SMS spam is a relatively new phenomenon here.
EDIT: I completely skipped over the point of the post. If you’re busy, or you don’t want to be called, can’t you just decline the call?
My work gave everyone digital desk phones. The calls come through the computer.
I still barely ever get calls, and the Voicemail go to my email.
At my last job they assigned one of those to me and never told me. I had already been there about a year when I discovered it. I had like 500 voicemails. Haha.
Calling is faster
Faster for the one who is calling, at the expense of the receiving person
Idk, it's usually faster for both, no?
You can just answer your friend and say hello. lol
I have interpreted this post to mean a work-related call, since you wouldn't mistake call from a friend for a spam call (it wouldn't be an unknown number, for one). Otherwise, yes, it would be weird to replace calls from people that are close to you with emails.
Work calls, though, could be replaced with written communication in 80-90% of the cases, and it would also make it easier to follow-up and continue the discussion across multiple days, if needed
Ok, that's totally fair. I would absolutely hate to get a work call from an unknown number. Tha didn't even cross my mind!
I was interpreting it as simply hearing your phone ring and thinking it could be a spam caller (I really need to set up custom ringtones at some point)
Ah yes, I want to listen to your "uuuhm" and "hold on, little Jon just shit himself", incoherent, un-premeditated thoughts, with absolutely no proof of the contents of the conversation.
At the end of the phonecall, I'll probably ask you to send me an email with a summary of what we talked about, because I can't be bothered to keep all that mess you've just unloaded in my memory.
Unless you're my dad or my mom, you're sending me a message in a way it's convenient to you.
I remember a very rude university lecturer called me once when I was in Tesco. He told me to turn off the Tesco self checkout because of background noise. I was in the middle of buying my groceries. Wut.
Something would get turned off really quick.
I think his wife did. He radiated big "divorced man" energy
I was talking about the phone lmao.
He also called me a "fucking asshole" as well which wasn't very pleasant. Basically he made an appointment for me to come to see him, notification of it was sent in the post as a footnote of a larger letter which didn't arrive until 2 days after.
A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The best ones are thoughts that many people can relate to and they find something funny or interesting in regular stuff.