Early warning system

How stupid is this?  

The other day Cicero was sitting at his desk minding his own business but of course obsessing how to meet the needs of customers as marketing folk are wont to do. Surprisingly and suddenly his phone rang-not a mobile one but one invented by Alexander Graham Bell. In other words the kind that don’t come with you to the toilet, let you shop on the go, tell you then time, let you take photos and even make the tea.

It was a co-worker.

Naturally Cicero was expecting to discuss important marketing matters or at least a review of the body politic and the state of the world. All he got was some chit chat about respective states of well-being.

But after a bit the talk moved onto the coup de grace of the discussion and the real purpose of the call and it was…..wait for it…..and Cicero kids you not…..to be informed that he was to be sent an e-mail later in the day to arrange for said the co-workers to meet and to swap war stories..

Yes, you heard it right. The purpose of the call was to warn Cicero that an e-mail was to wend its electronic way to his in-box. How absurd is that? Very, in Cicero's book.

Do we do act like this with any other form of communication?

It is no wonder that our in boxes are full to bursting each and every day. It is no surprise that server capacity is close to saturation with pointless e-mails like the one Cicero was to receive, with cheap promotions for dysfunctional penile remedies and off colour jokes.

E-mails were supposed to make our lives easier but you can only wonder at the high level of inefficiency in built to our communication processes if we are constantly making phone calls to warn of the impending arrival of an e-mail. Do we really need an early warning system for our e-mails?

It defies even Cicero’s logic that it was not possible to conclude arrangements there and then while telephone communing instead of waiting for the e-mail missive to arrive which will no doubt generate a flurry of e-mails as arrangements are made and unmade.

It is reckoned that on average it takes 8 e-mails today to make an appointment between two consenting adults. Previously it took one phone call. And they call this progress

And all the while attention is diverted away from the one person that really matters-the customer.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus.