Blame Alexander Graham Bell.
Before the Bellster invented the telephone, it was widely accepted that getting a co-worker to respond to you required patience. You also needed a loud voice, since the only way to communicate was to open the window and holler.
Communication-wise, these were the good old days. There were no emails, texts or Slack DMs, and, of course, there was no telephone. In most cases, getting someone to respond to you was so difficult and unfruitful that you didn’t even try. If you did try, you certainly didn’t expect anyone to get back to you immediately. Or ding them if they didn’t. Yet that is what happens today. We expect everyone to be immediately available, 24/7/365. And heaven help you if you ain’t.
I was reminded of this situation by “What If We Just Stopped Being So Available,” an article by Joe Pinsker in The Atlantic.
As Pinsker points out, “with the mass adoption of email and smartphones, the ‘acceptable’ window of response has gotten much smaller.” In fact, it has gotten positively microscopic. If your manager sends you a text and you don’t respond within seconds of them clicking “Send,” it not only reflects on your job performance, but it also indicates a lack of respect.
“What could you be doing that’s more important than responding to my email?” your manager will think. And, sorry, open-heart surgery does not excuse it.
But you can try — to excuse it, I mean. What drives Pinsky crazy is how we bend over backwards to apologize for something we really shouldn’t feel sorry about. Even a short, vanilla apology like “Sorry for the delay” can model “an unreasonable standard of responsiveness for the person we’re allegedly slow in getting back to.”
Ready to tap the brakes on the ever-accelerating call and response requirements of business communication today? Get back to me immediately, because I’m ready to share.
No. 1: You’re Not That Important.
Right off the bat, inform the sender that they are over-estimating the importance of their message — and their position. “I know you are a SVP of HR, and understand that you want to know the morale of the 10 percent of employees remaining after our brilliant 90 percent staff reduction, but do you know that scientists in 2004 calculated that 99942 Apophis, an asteroid the size of four and a half football fields, has a 2.7 percent probably that it will hit Earth on Friday, April 13, 2029.
“I’m sure you’ll agree that in preparation for this probability, I should clear my calendar immediately and therefore, won’t have time to respond to your request. (Ping me again on April 14, 2029, if we’re still here.)”
No. 2: Lovely to Hear From You.
Schmooze yourself to a little extra time by buttering up the nudnik manager who sent you a seemingly urgent email. “It was so wonderful to get your message,” you might begin. “The underlying sense of panic I read into your demand that I monitor eraser usage in the pencils provided to the Eastern District reminds me of how deeply you feel about issues the average manager would consider ridiculous. It is an honor to work for someone who is not embarrassed to show that they care. This is why you shouldn’t expect to hear a response until I am 110 percent certain that no nibblers, chewers and suckers diminish full eraser usage prematurely.”
At this point, you are free to delay your response or ignore the email altogether. Trust me, your manager will be so overwhelmed with their own wonderfulness that they will forget about you altogether.
No. 3: Why Bother?
Really! Do you think you’re the only one depressed with their career prospects? Up and down the org chart, your fellow employees are freaking out over how long they can compete with AI systems being installed with the sole objective of learning their jobs, so the AI can do their jobs. If they already have an AI agent to “help” them, any communication they send to you has to be bogus — a feeble attempt to make it look like they’re busy.
By ignoring the initial message and the flurry of frantic messages sure to follow, you’re giving your co-workers something to do and you will be loved for it throughout the company.
The only risk is that you feel guilty for ignoring time-critical communications, begin sending your own urgent messages, and, frustrated by slow responses, start doing work yourself.
If that doesn’t end your career, nothing will.
Bob Goldman was an advertising executive at a Fortune 500 company. He offers a virtual shoulder to cry on at info@creators.com.
Copyright 2026 Creators Syndicate Inc.