Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Mobile Electronic Gadgets Make Your Rude

I am not sure that everyone is going to find that newsworthy. Most of us have had far too much experience trying to communicate or to connect with someone who is distracted by a cell phone or text message or some other form of electronic connection.

Now a survey has found that more and more people are noticing that it is difficult to work well with someone who is constantly distracted or who acts as though the person in front of him is of less moment than the person who is texting him. Link here.

And that is not the half of it. If your attention is dispersed because you have allowed electronic gadgets to intrude on your time and space, you will not be very effective on your job. And if you are distracted from distraction by distraction, as Eliot put it, you are not likely to be in a very good mood either.

We should understand by now that focus and concentration are essential if we are going to work effectively and to relate well to other people. If you allow electronic gadgets to undermine your effectiveness and efficiency you will eventually have to pay a price.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

A good term for this type of rudeness was coined by George Will in one of his columns for Newsweek: "social autism".

Stuart Schneiderman said...

Very nice, thanks for passing it on...