Is Texting Getting In the Way of Responsibility and Conflict Resolution?
I’m still reeling. Our temporary babysitter who was filling in for about 4 hours a day during the work week, didn’t call when she decided that she wasn’t coming in today. She texted.
TEXT: I was at an interview and I got the job!
TEXT ANSWER: Good for you. When are you coming in?
I wondered how late she would be. Fifteen minutes? A half hour? My dog sat watching me longingly with his legs crossed as I promised to take him for a walk as soon as she arrived. My husband, Jason, is on a business trip so I had Tallie (18 months), Noah (10 weeks), and yes, said dog. Don’t get me wrong– I adore my kids but this was a curve ball that I didn’t see coming. Should I have? It was definitely not going to be a “shower day.” I was lucky I was wearing clothes. Oh well.
TEXT: idk bc she wants me to come bck to show me where everything is so idk when I can come cuz I start tmrw.
TEXT ANSWER: This is so wrong. Please call me so we can discuss.
No call. So I called. No answer. I called again. No answer. Left message. “This is very irresponsible. I don’t want to do this over text. You are supposed to be here today and tomorrow. Please call me ASAP. And yes, if you don’t come in, you’re fired.”
Not that she’d care. She had another job.
No call. Another text.
TEXT: Wow. Thanks for the rude message. Ha! You shld have paid me more. You made me clean up too.
TEXT ANSWER: I’m not doing this over text. Please call and take some responsibility and resolve this like adults.
No call.
Anyway, you get the gyst. Yes, I was enraged. Having to cancel all my appointments and work for the day, juggling 2 kids and 1 dog, and annoying myself that I hadn’t showered, I couldn’t believe I had run into it again. The irresponsible texter.
Do you know any of these?
TEXT: I dk that she was gonna give me the job so fast. And its a lot of money so i had to take it
TEXT: Good luck with your job. Bye.
I love text. I use it to answer WWWWH (Who What Where When How). Not Why. Not details. Not to have a conversation.
It’s concerning that someone could leave another completely in the lurch and yet take absolutely no responsibility for it. Hiding behind characters on a phone rather than speaking about it directly.
Is this what we are teaching our next generation?
We’ve all heard from other great writers like Rachel Simmons or Rosalind Wiseman about kids breaking up over text. Sending aggressive messages over text. But a young adult of 21 hired to do a job? Oy. When teens do it we should worry. But when young adults do it…we should be very concerned.
So…what are we supposed to do? Are we destined for a generation of adults who duck out of being accountable for their actions and find it all too easy to break ties, feed their egos, or unleash negative emotion sans face-to-face interaction or possible conflict resolution?
You tell me.
Is this a problem or is this…progress? In the mean time, thank goodness for naps.
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YES YES YES YES!!!!!! Email was bad enough, people hiding rather than talk face to face. Texting is an extension, keeping the walls up. It’s amazing that a product that is marketed as a way to keep in touch is in reality isolating us all.
I definitely see this as a problem. More and more I think we will see this. It is so easy for people to do things like this now with email and texting. No face to face contact. Right now it is mild, but I see it getting worse in the future. I see our kids and all morals and respect changing. Sad.
I mentioned this on twitter but I recently discussed this with my internship supervisor (sort of) because I tend to email when I need to tell him things rather than call. A big part of that is that I spend a good 90% of my time outside of said internship in class or at work where the option is email or nothing. I think it’s really easy to blame kids (I’m in my early 20s but you know what I mean) but I also think that more leadership education could easily solve the problem. Of course, some kids are lazy and will do it anyway but I honestly did not realize how much it bothered him that I was writing emails rather than calling.
All that said, I definitely think your baby sitter was in the wrong here (especially because you tried to call her and asked her to call you) but just another point of view.
How frustrating! I guess I can point out serious issues with this – other than the fact that she actually texted. What in her upbringing led her to believe that this was ok? I like to text as much as the next person – when you have something short to say. With that being said – I was taught that when you have a job, the professional thing to to is to give two weeks notice at any job. Preferrably give the notice in person, if not also in writing. Not over the phone in any manner!
My guess is that this young lady will have a very rude awakening one day.
Ooooh! I think we hit a touchy spot! Glad I wasn’t the only one who had a problem with this. Cooper, Dalia and Sarah- I agree. It’s only going to get worse. I use text a lot. But just not for this kind of thing. It’s about respect- even if it’s uncomfortable.
Kristina- I so appreciate your perspective. Yes, we do need to speak up and teach young people how to be responsible, what’s acceptable and what’s not. I usually go over “texting” and “phoning” during the interview process. Most tell me that they would never just “text” if they weren’t coming in. But then, it happens. Yes, it drives us nuts. If you are saying something that deserves an immediate response, call or go in so the person can actually give you one. If you are writing details, need details, need to explain something, or are doing something you know might not be received well, call or go in. Otherwise, it seems cursory or flippant. I thank you for speaking up and letting us know we all need to take responsibility for relaying this information.
Totally inappropriate. As someone with responsibilities (a job, school, friendships, etc.) you have to respect the person on the other end. I can’t imagine the thinking process that went into this. If it’s uncomfortable for you to call and you’d rather text it’s probably because you know it’s not going to be received well.
@Rebecca, I think you nailed it. It’s the dodge factor. I get it with ALL ages…actually. Not just kids. People DO use media to hide behind, kind of like the errant driver who pulls out in front of you and looks the other way as if to pretend you’re not really there. (that bugs me big time too!—It’s like ‘no you can’t hit me because then you’d rear-end me and I can’t see you now so there—the maturity equivalent of putting fingers in your ears as a toddler)
@Robyn, yep, have had sitters like that…and frankly have seen the same scenario replayed with interns throughout this summer…I had a total of six and not ONE followed through. Not ONE. Couldn’t complete a dang thing. Always an excuse. Always a reason. Always a text or an email to ‘explain’ and yes, you can feel I DO have some heat on it, because the whole point of hiring people is to get RELIEF not to be the one relied upon to discipline/handhold/train to be responsible yadayada.
p.s. This has happened with teens AND collegiates AND mid-20s grad students, so the 21y.o. expectation doesn’t even raise one eyebrow here. Sorry. sigh.
Hang tough.
You’re so right! We are teaching our children to deal with situations via text. I was watching tv with my girls a month or so ago and there was a PSA about girls who had a conflict and they resolved it by texting each other. I couldn’t believe it! Thank goodness I was watching with them and was able to turn it into a teachable moment.
Here’s the irony, Robyn, as we were communicating about this on Twitter, I was beginning to feel a bit of miscommunication as we were restricted to 140. I was bringing up the point that your blog is a great blog to use as a learning experience for all of us. As parents, we can learn from others’ experiences and use them to set our own boundaries. Your post inspires me to talk with my own sitters to ask them to keep our communication the old-fashioned way–via phone. I would never text my boss that I was coming in late to work, and as you mention, these lines are becoming blurred.
We’re all learning. Thank you for your thought provoking post!
However, as our communication via Twitter in 140 continued, I wondered if you may be taking the tweets as a hindsight 20/20 for you, which was not the intent at all.
This all goes to show the perils of brief written communication. There is so much more to communication that we don’t get via texting and tweeting, even e-mail for that matter. Non-verbal communication ranking #1. It is a concern that texting has become the favored method of communication for teens. As parents we can help them by highlighting some of the short-comings and helping them through situations they get themselves into. Another concern is the empathy factor–but that’s another post.
I’m not condoning what the babysitter did, however I would imagine that if we back up 30 years or more we could probably have this same conversation about the irresponsibilty of quitting a job or breaking up over the phone instead of in person.
The real issue is the other point you made about the lack of responsibility for the commitment that the babysitter made to you. Without knowing any involved parties beyond this blog post I would assume that there was a pattern of behavior with both parties that was ignored and eventually lead to this situation. Not blaming, just saying communication wasn’t the best all along.
Not saying what the baby sitter did was OK …
But wouldn’t it have been the same if she called and said that she couldn’t come ???
you still would have to find an alternatives, right ???
(Just discovered you via your book at my local library and I’m dealing with an 11-year girl who is lovely, talented, kind, intelligent, and unhappy. Why? Because she’s “a rectangle pillow”…she’s 11!!! She’s supposed to be a rectangle pillow.)
Anyway, she’s my youngest and I have a 14-year old son and a 19-year old son. I have strongly discouraged texting and twitter because I feel more and more that the children/young adults I see using this technology are losing the opportunity to develop social skills as well as communication skills. Empathy, awareness, compassion, and responsiveness are just a few of the things they lose when they reduce their communication to vowel-less phrases. Watching a group of teenagers “together” is like watching a bunch of toddlers in the sandbox: it is parallel play at a different level. The interaction is minimal, at best. The insulative aspect of this type of communication is stunting their awareness of how their actions are affecting others. Yes, I can see its place, but texting isn’t being limited to the wwwws you suggested…it is replacing face to face or at least voice to voice communication. As for Twitter, I know it is pervasive, possibly ubiquitous at this point, but as you discovered, you can’t possibly convey all you mean in 140 characters and I really don’t care when people go to the grocery store and fold laundry or hit the latest club.
As to the person who said the phone call wouldn’t have been different, I disagree, as the phone call would have made your babysitter own her actions and deal with the consequences of her choices. Yes, it would have been inconvenient for you if she’d followed through with the same actions, but she might have avoided those actions if she’d had to own them.