A few years ago, it was common to hear about people who only responded to e-mail once or twice a day. Journalist Sarah Green was like that, with a three-times-a-day strategy, but now, like so many of us, she feels pressured to answer messages as soon as they arrive.
On Harvard Business Review’s Editors Blog, she notes that e-mail used to be seen as beneficial because it was asynchronous – you could communicate without having to connect at the exact same time with a correspondent. No longer.
“We’re essentially communicating in something like real time, without any of the benefits of actually communicating in actual real time. Instead of talking with one person and getting something done, we’re carrying on simultaneous conversations with hundreds of people and struggling to get anything done. When I look at my inbox, I hear a cacophony of voices all shouting for my attention,” she writes.
Read more: Beware the ‘responsiveness trap’ of e-mail - The Globe and Mail
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