Virtually Ignoring People

There's a well written article in the New York Times about the growing incivility in the use of of handheld devices (e.g. Blackberries, iPhones) during meetings, and the general premise is that for all intents and purposes, the use of these devices during meetings is tantamount to walking up from the table and ignoring the discussion because you're bored or you simply don't care that much about the topic at hand.

That assessment seems brutal, but it's probably true. The article also hits it spot on when it addresses the common rationalizations of why people do this (myself included). Those who pull out their Blackberries during meetings (or we'd defensively argue, "lulls and breaks between topics during meetings") will claim that it's multi-tasking at its best. Since our jobs have become so overwhelming and the demands are so daunting, there's a good chance that there's some sort of request or query that we've received in the past thirty minutes, so why not do the sender a favor and respond when we can?

But the reality of the matter is that 99% of those e-mail requests can wait, and the topic at hand in the meeting just isn't grabbing us. Sure, the fact that many employees feel overwhelmed with things to do certainly adds to the phenomena, and this also serves to cloud our judgment in terms of what ought to be important enough to warrant our full attention. You can blame the proliferation of meetings that have absolutely no purpose and corporate cultures that are collaborative to the point of inaction (my company is notorious for this), but at the end of the day, there's nothing like sitting at a meeting and seeing your peers all fixated at their respective 2-inch screens tapping away.

Our handheld wireless devices are great sources of convenience, but it's also made being rude a heckuva lot easier. Just think, ten years ago I would actually have to step away from the meeting and take fake bathroom breaks to show just how disengaged I was.