(By John Shomby) Take a second or two, right now, and look at that smartphone you have. What’s your current relationship with this mobile communications device? Does it control you or do you control it? Maybe these stats will help answer that question:
- The average smartphone owner unlocks their phone 150 times daily.
- 71% sleep with or next to their mobile phone.
- 85% of smartphone owners check their devices while speaking with friends and family.
- 89% of our cell phone usage is self-initiated.
- Average time spent daily with the smartphone is 3 hours and 15 minutes.
Now, tell me your answer.
I recently viewed an eye-opening Ted Talk from a technology entrepreneur by the name of Joey Odom discussing how we can take back control of our devices and improve our relationships. He has developed a product called Aro that is designed to change our phone habits and assist in reinstituting face-to-face communication. Check out the 12-minute talk here. (I’ll wait…)
I’m not going to tout this product or its benefits, but I do want to talk about why Odom developed it and how this issue is having a huge effect on our industry and our world. If I had a nickel for every “I’m busier than ever” answer I’ve gotten when I ask how someone is doing (email, text or in person), I could probably buy a cluster of stations. Being in business for myself the past three years, I can see this from an entirely different perspective. For more years than most of you have been on this earth, I had spent 10 to 12 hours per day in my radio station(s) office on average.
As we got into the 2000’s, technology advanced at a torrid rate. With this increase, came increased accessibility. As my accessibility increased, the lines between life at work and life at home blurred more than ever. Just from my own experience, I know the anxiety of a superior who needs a quick answer about an issue with a station. Those issues and requests increased in direct proportion to the number of supervisors I gained with the passing of each year. I was, myself, “busier than ever”. My “office” was now in my back pocket, staring at me in my car, or on my bedroom nightstand. Wherever I was, so was my “office”.
Now, more than ever, that’s the case for just about every manager of any level in this business (or any business). Because of our mobile “office”, face-to-face communication has become quick and impersonal for the most part even with our loved ones. We’ve talked about creativity with our personalities, taking musical chances, running less commercials, etc. Joey Odom lands on, what I think, is the real problem, yet with a very simple fix. One powerful quote in his Ted Talk resonated with me – “You have access to 8 billion people on your phone. With face-to-face communication, when you put that phone away and look a person in the eye, you’ve told them that he/she is more important than every one of those 8 billion!” Our excuse is lack of time but there is plenty of it if we operate the technology and not let the technology operate us!
Try this: (I have and it works)
If you have a one-on-one meeting, a lunch appointment, dinner date or a quick coffee with someone, keep the phone in your back pocket, or your desk drawer or leave it in your car. Be totally focused on your meeting, your partner, your friend. Watch how “business” gets done and a relationship builds. And those, calls, texts, and emails? They will still be there when you’re finished for you to handle. I’ll bet it won’t matter to your supervisor that it took 30 minutes or so to get back to him/her.
The more we focus on each other first, the better our communication and I will bet some amazing ideas will emerge. In our business, or any business, it’s time for us to control the definition of our relationships, not our devices.
Based in Nashville, TN, John Shomby is the owner and CEO of Country’s Radio Coach. He is focused on coaching and mentoring artists, radio programmers, and on-air talent to help them grow and develop inside the radio station and the industry. Reach John at [email protected] and 757-323-1460. Read John’s Radio Ink archives here.
