Waaaay Too Much Contact Hurts Productivity: An Example

Let me give you an example of what I meant in the previous posting.

Early this week, I had one lovely man call my office at a time I'd specified I would be out. He left a voice mail. But instead of leaving it there, he then proceeded to:

• Send me a follow-up e-mail telling me he had called.

• Then leave a message on my cell phone (I was out of range so voice mail again picked up) alerting me that he had left the first voice mail and sent e-mail followup. Next, he calls my home number and leaves not one but two messages.

• Then he gets on one of the instant messaging services to look for me. When he doesn't find me there, he loads up two other messaging services and goes through the process of sending a message to authorize him to contact me directly through the messaging service.

• (Oh yes, it goes on)Now he calls me again at my office, getting my voice mail, to tell me to authorize him on instant messaging.

• Next, he copies that first follow-up mail from the first phone call to me at two additional e-mail addresses (ones I don't typically use for work).

• He does something else for five minutes THEN he text messages my cell phone BEFORE he calls to leave a third office voice mail to say he's text messaged me.

• Finally, he re-sends the very first e-mail YET AGAIN to EVERY e-mail address for me he could find, as well as goes to one of my Web sites and posts a note through the comment tool. This, he tops off with two more calls to my office voice mail, and one final round of text messages and cell voice mails and e-mail.

And why was he trying to contact me, you ask? Because he wanted to set up a conference call the FOLLOWING WEEK. Just for shits and giggles, I did a time study on how much time it took me to go through all of his schizophrenia-frenzied methods of contact: just over 20 minutes.

And the irony? He is the one who is usually difficult to reach. He won't return a damned call or e-mail until he needs something himself. Nor is this aberrant behavior for him; he frequently does this manic communication flood. No matter how many times I specify when I won't be available (cell service here is spotty), that's when he loves to contact me. And I always contact him immediately after I actually receive a message.

You know what? I think when we talk next week, I'll kindly tell him that the next contract we do together, I'm going to specify a per-contact charge. I'll be a millionaire in a week!