Phone Calls - A Dying Skill?

The other day, I overheard a conversation on the train about how unnecessary phone calls have become and why texting or sending emails is so much better and more efficient. I was tempted to butt in the conversation, to argue in favour of a good old phone call.

I didn't, saving my thoughts for this week's blog instead.

Once upon a telephone …

Do you recall when phones looked like the yellow one on the picture? (If you are under thirty, this was before the age of portable phones and smartphones.)

When Alexander Graham Bell designed the first telephone in 1876, he ushered in the age of communicating and connecting across distance. Revolutionary!

150 years later and the world is technically more connected than ever, with a host of communication channels at our fingertips. While corded phones and landlines are relics of the past, life without a mobile phone is hard to imagine. More people have access to a mobile phone today than to a toilet.

Who/what rules what/whom?

I spend way too much time using my smartphone.

And I am no exception.

Our smartphones have come to rule a big chunk of our day. Yet we rarely use them for what good old Mr Bell originally designed them for: talking.

Somewhere along the line, when phones became "smart", having a conversation took a back seat. Communication has to be fast and easy.

There is more to (good) communication

But fast and easy is not always better. The "smart " thing to do is to consider what we want to achieve when we communicate. Sometimes a text, an email or communicating via a screen will do the trick. But texts and emails deprive us of hearing someone's voice, of interacting, listening, inquiring and connecting on a more personal level. Emojis are great, but they cannot replace emotional context. Skype, Zoom and Co. have been true life savours during the pandemic; but images can distract from having deeper and more thoughtful conversations, both in the professional and the personal realm.

Time to revive a dying skill

I guess I was fortunate to grow up in an era when phone calls were the done thing. We didn't just react to messages; we had conversations. The term "phone anxiety" was unheard of. But it has become a common disorder, especially among millennials. According to a 2019 survey among UK office workers, 76% of millennials have anxious thoughts when their phone rings and want to avoid phone calls. We fear the unknown and, for many, making a phone call is, or is becoming, unknown territory.

So this is a plea to revive and appreciate phone calls as a highly meaningful communication skill worth (re-)discovering and (re-)learning - what do you say?

Have a fabulous day!

Mila