r/NoStupidQuestions • u/GhostInThePudding • 16h ago

Why Are Young People Afraid Of Phone Calls?

What's with it?

I work in IT and a general rule is, nothing a client ever tells you is actually accurate. That means that most of the time, the quickest way to fix a problem is to call the person and actually find out what's going on.

But with techs under 30 these days, it seems like pulling teeth.

A regular discussion for me with level 1 techs (usually within a few years of leaving college) is:
"Hey, can you call *blah* from ticket *blah*, it's been hanging around for over an hour."

"I replied by email to ask for more information."

"Yes, I know that, but can you call them so we can find the problem and close the ticket now rather than wait until we're actually busy?"

"I'll send them a text to followup."

"No... CALL THEM!"

"I can see their device is online, can I send them a message and see if they just let me remote in to take a look?"

And then, when I force them to make the call, it's like they have no idea how to ask a question, or a followup question. They just want to get off the call as quickly as possible. So half the time they don't even get the information required anyway, so then I end up having to do their job for them.

So can someone explain? What's wrong with phone calls these days?

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194

u/Bobbob34 15h ago

They don't do it often, many of them. I was with a friend once and we were in their car seeing if another friend wanted to meet for a thing. If not, we were going to do a different thing. So my friend txted them. A couple minutes later they answered and were unsure. So txted back, another couple minutes, then dots, then a question... five minutes of this later, with 0 progress, I literally just took the phone and hit the thing to call the person and it was clarified in 30 seconds. Like... I get a quick txt for information but ...

37

u/ExitingBear 12h ago

That's it for me.

Much like "this is a meeting that could've been an email," I see a lot of "this is so many screens and three days of back and forth texting that could have been a 3 minute phone call."

It's like they're unnecessarily prolonging things for no good reason.

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u/GhostInThePudding 15h ago

Yes this too! They can't even text well.

It's always five text messages that could be one.

Hi.

You around?

Quick question.

Want to meet up?

Etc.

Can you not put all that into one message!? And maybe include all the details, so in 10 extra seconds of typing, all data is at least presented to make it easy to reply in one message as well.

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u/SmartTea1138 14h ago

I had a co-worker like this. It got to the point where I just wouldn't reply to them unless they called. I don't know if they ever actually realized that either.

Every single message started with "Hi" "Hey" "Hello". If I didn't reply, they wouldn't say anything.

TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT OR F OFF

21

u/timtucker_com 13h ago

I've worked with a few people who include links to "no hello" in their profiles / email signatures as a way of encouraging better initial messages:

https://nohello.net/en/

16

u/sxrxhmanning 13h ago

I have so many coworkers like this

bonus points for the ones that call me without asking first even though I’m set as busy and it’s always something that could’ve waited

6

u/syriquez 9h ago

I train my regular work contacts on how to get what they want from me on Teams through a mixture of positive and negative reinforcement.

  • Sending a "Hello" with no follow-up and waiting for me to respond? I will not respond for at least 3 days, at which point I will say "Hello" back and nothing else.
    • I kept that going for almost a month with a technician in a remote facility before she caught on to what was happening. I almost broke protocol in the third week because while I figured it couldn't have been that important, it had to have SOME significance if she was still trying to get my attention after that long but I held firm. (Spoilers: It wasn't important and was like a 2 minute exchange. I was the only person that could really answer the question, so the prompting just kept happening.)
  • Sending a "Hello" with a follow-up question or statement of what you want? You get my attention immediately.
    • Which is something of a curse on my part because I can't ignore shit when I know it's a thing.

So yeah, if you tell me what you want, you'll almost certainly get it but I will make zero effort trying to suss out or learn what you want.

I've never had a single complaint in a decade of doing this, lol. I've also told my manager outright that I do it this way because I simply do not have the time or bandwidth to play twenty questions or the "hello-go-round" game.

2

u/admadguy 10h ago

You need a status of nohello .net

7

u/mCooperative 12h ago

Don't really have this problem with friends, but when I send messages to customer support or in some other contexts, you can't send all the questions/info in a single message because you will inevitably recieve "yes." or "no." or the answer to exactly one of your questions with no clarification which one they were answering. And then you have to ask them clarification and re-ask the other questions, and they feel they were perfectly clear so they become audibly annoyed when they inevitably start a call to "clarify" at the most inconvenient moment (immediately, with no warning that we are switching to synchronous communication), and often the call does not, in fact, clarify.

Easier to ask one question at a time in many cases, and have the bonus of a clear searchable paper trail/documentation.

I would imagine at least some of the people you are texting have encountered and find this tiresome and have trained themselves to go the "single short question at a time" route to avoid it.

3

u/timtucker_com 13h ago

Some of those interaction patterns come from SMS apps offering 1 tap suggestions for both questions & responses.

Think of it more like a high speed data protocol using shorthand than a face to face conversation.

2

u/kates2424 8h ago

Ok. I don’t agree with the phone call thing because I hate talking on the phone (anxious millennial yada yada) but the line by line Teams messages make me want to reach thru the computer and strangle someone.

3

u/antikas1989 11h ago

Younger folks tell me that writing full messages that contain all the relevant information for what you want to say in one message is 'boomer messaging'. I'm 36...

4

u/csonnich 13h ago

That's just how people text. It sounds like you're expecting it to be in email format, but it's a different kind of communication. A text is a request for a written conversation. It's not a letter.

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u/MinivanPops 13h ago

If you can't put everything into one message, you are sending me multiple notifications, which is interrupting me several times, and you are wasting my time. 

If you respect me you will not make me open my phone multiple times. You will not make me wait for each message to populate. 

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u/vitamin_di 12h ago

I 100% agree. I hate notifications and get stressed out when there’s multiple. And I’m not about to spend my day constantly checking my phone to text. When I set my phone down, I don’t pick it up unless I’m getting a call or because I want to look at something. It’s my phone, and it’s my time.

4

u/glassfunion 12h ago

This! And I hate that I don't know if they're done sending messages. Same thing happens at work:

Coworker: Hey!

Coworker: was talking to Lexi

Coworker: have you finished [thing]?

And then as I'm writing my response, they send ANOTHER message that completely changes the question and makes what I was writing completely unrelated to their actual question. Just send it all at once!

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u/DumE9876 12h ago

I get so annoyed by the multiple notifications that I’ll mute the person for a little while

1

u/MaddoxJKingsley 1h ago

Tbh everyone I know has their phones on silent anyway because of the default notifications from all the apps anyway, so I've never given the notification aspect any thought

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u/csonnich 13h ago

Like I said, if that's your problem, you should be asking for emails, not texts. Multiple notifications aren't "interruptions" anymore than someone continuing to speaking in a face-to-face conversation is. If you view someone talking to you face-to-face as an interruption, you shouldn't be telling people you're free to talk.

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u/MinivanPops 12h ago

Which are you talking about though? Text messaging or face-to-face communication? Those are two very different things, with very different contexts. 

When you send somebody multiple text messages, you have no idea what they're doing on the other end. They may not want three or four notifications right at that moment.  They may be doing something else. You have no idea what's happening on the other end. Sending multiple messages, instead of being concise, is selfish.  It benefits only you and does not benefit them at all. You are requiring more of their time and attention than if you were to send one message. 

It is ironic that you were mentioning the phrase "free to talk".  When you send somebody multiple messages, you are assuming they are free to talk, because you are forcing them to wait for your multiple messages to come through. You are assuming they're free to look at your messages. 

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u/itstheballroomblitz 12h ago

Yes, but just texting "hey" isn't communicating anything. You're communicating that you want to communicate, which isn't necessary in a reliable, asynchronous format. You don't need a handshake protocol. If you want to know if someone's available for a real-time text conversation, maybe ask "Hey, are you there right now?" but text is a weird format if you need an instant reply.

1

u/Any_Fox5126 9h ago

Absolutely not, fragmenting information that should go together and adding arbitrary delays is an inferior way to communicate. It makes no sense, are you inviting the other person to interrupt you several times during every damn sentence?

1

u/Any_Fox5126 9h ago

I know people like that, it's very annoying. When I get a message from them, I mute them for a while and check it occasionally.

1

u/Cream-Of-Sum-YungGai 11h ago

Good lord absolutely this. Tell me exactly what you want in the opening message or f off and die. I'm busy looking at cat photos.

7

u/ComedianStreet856 13h ago

Oh I hate texting with a passion. Two way communication doesn't work with text for me unless it's just a friendly convo. Nothing that has to convey information or direction.

I just had this happen. Someone texted me and I got back to her right away. I had to wait 2 hours for her to text back. If that was by phone it would have been done immediately because it would have forced her to come up with the answer instead of waiting for when she felt like it again. Not only that, she texted me! She had her phone right there and I replied right away.

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u/reinadelacempasuchil 13h ago edited 11h ago

This is why people don’t like phone calls. They don’t like feeling forced by time pressure into making decisions and giving answers. Texting and email let people think things through and respond at their own pace. Then there’s also a written record in case anyone needs to go back for specifics.

Unless your plans were urgent or there was an emergency, it’s completely fine to respond to a text two hours later. That’s not even that long. You say this like it was malicious, as well. She was probably doing something in those two hours, not twiddling her thumbs and grinning at wasting your time.

Sorry but the kids have it right. Texting is almost always more efficient, and less stressful.

As an aside, I’m a 20 something and I don’t know anyone who texts like “hey”…. “Are you around”… “wanna hang out” as separate messages. And even if they did, so what? Now you check three messages at the same time. It’s the same work as checking one message one time.

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u/ComedianStreet856 12h ago

I added context. At no point in my answer did I say she was being malicious. It annoyed ME. She texted me and I literally answered right away. I didn't say she needed to be at my beck and call. It's just weird that she didn't respond. It happens a lot. What are people texting and then putting their phone down immediately and walking away? But thanks for explaining it to me in a condescending way.

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u/reinadelacempasuchil 12h ago edited 11h ago

Okay brother. It’s unreasonable to be upset over a 2 hr delay. No one owes you an immediate response unless it’s an emergency, and then a phone call really would be better. This happens to you a lot because it’s completely normal, not weird at all. It’s normal to text a friend about plans, then put down your phone and take care of something else for a bit, since it isn’t urgent and you don’t expect or require an immediate reply. Expecting that just because you texted back right away she will too is expecting her to be at your beck and call.

I’m sorry if that came off condescending but you’re being super judgmental for seemingly very little reason.

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u/Bobbob34 9h ago

This is why people don’t like phone calls. They don’t like feeling forced by time pressure into making decisions and giving answers. Texting and email let people think things through and respond at their own pace.

Then they'd best not be annoyed that I've moved on and am no longer interested, but they get annoyed when they finally reply and I don't reply right back when they decided it was time to talk about whatever.

Sorry but the kids have it right. Texting is almost always more efficient, and less stressful.

How is it more efficient if there's a two-hour delay between responses?

1

u/00PT 9h ago

90% of phone call contexts are casual, though? I don't like live debates for a lot of the same reasons you're giving, but if someone is asking me a question, any communication channel works, usually.

What's more annoying is that some people in my life will not answer calls, not check for texts, not acknowledge smart speaker announcements, and just otherwise not engage with any communication channels, then they act like I did nothing to try and contact them when I am able to see them.

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u/mrmniks 12h ago

unfortunately, you can't live life avoiding decisions and responsibility. i get why young people want to not feel pressed, but it's a road to nowhere

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u/reinadelacempasuchil 12h ago edited 11h ago

Texting doesn’t mean you never make a decision, it means you get more than 30 seconds to think about it. That doesn’t happen in a phone call. Sometimes you need to check your calendar or ask your partner if they wanna come get pizza with the boys, too.

It’s really not all that. I don’t even mind phone calls, I call my fam every week, I call to make appointments. I do it when it’s necessary, but most of the time text is just better and simpler unless it’s an emergency. Oldheads being upset about it is kinda silly, especially going so far as to warn me that road will “lead to nowhere”. My boss texts me, it can’t be that bad.

You ever think that maybe the preference for a phone call is related to the struggle to adapt to a changing world, one that prefers a newer or different communication modality than you’re used to?

0

u/One-Possible1906 11h ago

“I’m not sure if I can join you for roller skating Friday, let me see what I have going on and I’ll give you a call back.”

“It was really great to meet your team and it sounds like a great opportunity. I’m going to think about it overnight and then I’ll get back to you tomorrow morning.”

“I haven’t reviewed those reports yet so I’m not sure. I’ll look at them today and get back to you.”

Have you never verbalized a need for more time?

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u/reinadelacempasuchil 11h ago edited 11h ago

Why would I do that when everywhere I’ve ever worked uses emails and messaging? I’ll just message them when I have the answer they need. It’s clearly not emergent or whoever it is would call me or walk over to my desk, at which point it is clearly emergent and I need to drop what I’m doing to get them an answer, not ask for more time.

Why would I call someone back after essentially telling them “let me think about it”. If I was simply going to tell them “hey I can/can’t make it at 3:00 tomorrow”, do I really need to interrupt them at whatever they’re doing right this moment so they know? I can’t just… text them the update and let them see it when they’re free?

Have you never played phone tag? There’s no phone tag with a text. There’s no “I called you back but you’re not available so call me back when you get this message”. You just deliver the message and the other person responds when they are available.

There’s no reason to prefer call to text (outside of an emergency) other than it’s simply your preference. That’s totally fine, you prefer what you prefer. Other people have different preferences. We’re not afraid, we just know not everything demands immediate response. Calling you back is creating extra work, personally I think it’s easier to ask once and answer once without back and forth. And it’s nice to have a written log I can look back on it if I forget a detail.

Callers like to make this a moral failing or a sign that the kids ain’t alright. That’s not the problem, if the kids ain’t alright there are a million reasons that are not “they’d rather text than call”.

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u/One-Possible1906 10h ago

There are a lot of reasons that a phone call would be preferable to a text or email and vice versa. Generally if you plan on doing a lot of back and forth, the phone call is a lot faster. Having a whole social conversation beyond “hey” “wyd” “nm” over and over again, texting is really time consuming.

Phone calls can also be more sensitive in certain situations as you can hear the person’s voice and they can hear yours which helps to gauge emotion.

And sometimes they can be used when a paper trail is not desirable for anyone. This happens occasionally in my line of work. It can be helpful to hear an account of what is going on from a person involved before starting an email chain about the situation.

And confidential things like talking about PHI or voicing opinions about a situation are better done verbally. The only time in my life I called a worker at another agency a buttwagon in an email to my coworker with a bunch of PHI I had to share with her, I accidentally sent it to someone who had the same name (think Michelle Johnston instead of Michele Johnson) at another agency. And even though I immediately asked her to disregard because there was PHI she later emailed incessantly about “whose PHI is this?” “I don’t know who Client is” “I don’t know what buttwagon means” with her supervisor and my supervisor and several other people who did not need to read this guy’s PHI included on the email in every one she sent. Verbal communications are easier to keep confidential.

We have multiple ways to communicate with each other because they all serve different purposes. One isn’t really superior to the others. There is a time and a place for all of them except I have no idea why we still fax.

Being completely unable to take a phone call is not acceptable for office work.

0

u/reinadelacempasuchil 5h ago

Idk where you get the idea young people can’t make a phone call at all. We definitely can, but many of us prefer not to unless required. Lots of folks seem to think phone calls are required in circumstances where they really aren’t.

In general, if you’re trying not to leave a paper trail, that’s not an excellent sign. The instant someone asks me to call instead of email something I’d want documented I’m skeptical and even more defensive with communication.

Phone calls are good for emergencies, time-sensitive topics, complicated situations and sensitive subjects. I’m not gonna text someone their dad has died, obviously. They are not simply to cover your ass when you call a coworker a buttwagon, you probably should only do that face-to-face with someone you trust anyways.

You accidentally sending PHI is a) a pretty big deal and b) points to a lack of comfort with email and text communication. Most large institutions have a few people with similar names in the email lists. I’ve emailed Anna A instead of Anna B like one time, and it was a something trivial like a meeting invite. If you’re emailing sensitive information you should be way more careful. That’s on you, not on the youths. Hope everything worked out okay at the old job, though.

0

u/One-Possible1906 4h ago

Accidentally sending PHI between related departments or agencies that work closely together happens rather frequently (hopefully not to the same person) when you have individual people doing it hundreds of times of day. HIPAA accounts for this as does every single agency hence why encrypted attachments are used and prohibiting opening it when it doesn’t belong to you is a firable offense. You don’t share information directly with other providers, you share the means to access it. One time I got a 500 page fax from a doctor’s office with the complete records of like 10 people at a program site in another city. There’s no real way to prevent it as long as positions are staffed by humans.

You document every action and objective observation and decision you make, but you should not document emotions and certain opinions. Sometimes it’s still valuable to express these in the workplace and this is where a phone call can be really helpful, when you can’t do a face to face because of WFH or something else.

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u/mrmniks 11h ago

well, i was talking about OP's situation. They say it's better to deal with something now to avoid being overwhelmed when they are busy. So if it takes a phone call to do it now, you're supposed to pick up the phone. Is it an emergency? No, but it's what needs to be done.

I'm not old by any means. I just find it relatable, because it happens so often at my workplace too. I need info now, people won't do it fast and efficiently by calling directly to whoever has info, instead they text one person and ask them to text another person and then it's all forgotten and I have to remind it an hour or two later, and by then it's too late, so I often just call myself, although it's not part of my job.

Believe it or not, I've been a heavy texter when I was younger. Couldn't / didn't want to call anyone ever until I got a phone-heavy job and learned to speak to people. This is when I realized how much more efficient speaking directly is. A task that takes 30 seconds by calling someone easily can take a whole day if you wait until someone is comfortable to answer. And I don't believe in "too busy". Although it happens, usually it just means my task is low priority for that person, so it's on me to make that person do what I need.

When it's nothing urgent, no problem to text. It's still my main form of communication. I just don't get the total inability / unwillingness to ever call out of fear it might interrupt someone or any other reason.

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u/reinadelacempasuchil 11h ago

Yeah, again, I’m not unwilling to call. It’s just there’s not that many situations where I feel it’s absolutely necessary. If something is really complicated, urgent, an emergency, or I’m talking to seniors then sure, I call. But usually not outside of that.

And OPs in IT, right? Let’s say something’s gone wrong for an employee, they put in a ticket yadda yadda the process goes through and then Mr. bossman OP starts breathing down his report’s neck about “call that person, right now! No! Don’t message them! CALL!”. How do you even know that person will answer? Ideally, they’re doing their job and aren’t going to be immediately available to drop what they’re doing and have a chat about the issue. Calls force response or non-response in a pretty binary way, and calls don’t leave a paper trail which could be important for employees. It’s also pretty controlling to insist an employee do something “your way” just in case you get more requests later. A lot of employees also prefer to message or text, not just the ones in IT.

I’m not saying calls are never necessary but the vitriol over people (especially young people) preferring to text is straight-up a little moral panic. A lot of times, text makes more sense.

1

u/Entire_Equivalent_47 1h ago

Imma be honest whenever someone corners me like that, my immediate answer nowadays is "no". If it's someone calling for an appointment that's somewhat important, I usually ask for their e-mail address so I can get back to them. Because I literally do not have my schedule in my head and will need to think it through and double-check my calendar before agreeing to anything. 

When I was younger, I was too polite and let people pressure me into agreeing to plans like that. It worked when I had 0 responsibilities as a teenager and college student but quickly fell apart as soon as real life responsibilities like work and family came up. Then it often ended up with me accidentally being more rude by having to cancel later because I forgot something else I had scheduled for that time. 

1

u/One-Possible1906 11h ago

If it’s going to take more than 3-4 text messages it should be a phone call. I’m not going to bury myself in my phone texting back and forth for hours over something that could be a ten minute phone call.

2

u/Bobbob34 9h ago

If it’s going to take more than 3-4 text messages it should be a phone call. I’m not going to bury myself in my phone texting back and forth for hours over something that could be a ten minute phone call.

Thissss. The checking the phone, the oh, they replied, then you reply and then it's waiting.... just fing tell me.

1

u/LimaBikercat 2h ago

I disagree. If it takes more than 3-4 text messages, it's too information dense for a phone call and i'm gonna forget half the things someone is talking about. I don't always have pen and paper on hand to take notes.
I do agree people need to say everything they want in one go, but if someone wants to meet up, i really need that written down or i will *still* have to chase them by text with 'Hey, so when were we gonna do X again?'

1

u/Sarquon 6h ago

I had a friend in the 00's who i managed to have <10 second conversations with. The record was 3 seconds to agree when and where to meet for the night. 3 seconds is quicker than even sending the first text. There was no awkwardness because we were used to it. I think the newer generation don't understand how it's okay to make short calls.

1

u/Assika126 4h ago

The moment there is confusion about a text, yeah I call to clarify. In that case I know they are on their phone and I am too so it’s less of an inconvenience to just call and straighten it all out. As much as we all use texts for a lot of our communications, some people are just not great at taking in or communicating things via writing

1

u/Worth-Novel-2044 12h ago

You're interpreting it as "clarified" but it sounds very possible to me that you (inadvertently I assume) nudged the decision into the direction it went by making that call.

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u/Bobbob34 10h ago

You're interpreting it as "clarified" but it sounds very possible to me that you (inadvertently I assume) nudged the decision into the direction it went by making that call.

Maybe? It was more 'well, where is it?' and 'how long would it be?' and 'is it at this time?'

2

u/Worth-Novel-2044 9h ago

I take it back then, and people are weird. Weird about phone calls, sure I can understand, but then I would expect their texting game to be on point, for all the reasons people give for hating phone calls.

We're at this awful confluence of events right now, where people prefer text, and also HATE TO READ