Stop Ghosting in Business
Have you ever sent someone an e-mail message or otherwise communicated with them to no avail? Did it ever make you wonder whether they received your message? Or worse, that, they received and never responded? Did it seem that they abruptly cut off all communication without any explanation?
Well unfortunately, if any of the above situations has ever happened to you, you’ve been officially ghosted. Mind you, sometimes, being the doer or receiver of ghosting is not necessarily bad news, especially in the case of a floundering personal relationship that was heading nowhere positive.
By contrast, ghosting in the business sense, can be perceived as crass, disrespectful and conduct unbecoming of any serious-minded individual or entity. For example, have you ever submitted a job application and never received as much as an acknowledgement that it was received? How did you feel? Did that company’s action (or lack thereof) inspire you to ever want to work with them? Likewise, did you feel annoyed and demotivated by their action?
Plain talk, bad manners: Yes. Particularly when you invested of your time to reduce your range of professional qualifications to paper and also submit copies of same to an organization, indicating your willingness to be a part of their team based on what they have proposed and what you think you bring to the table, it seems reasonable that, you would want some basic recognition of your initial effort to advance that relationship.
Therefore this “new-age” practice of only committing to respond to “suitable applications” is in my respectful view, an extraordinary exercise in miscommunication. What does that phrase truly mean? For example, as the applicant, you might remain unclear as to whether you were over-qualified or under-qualified.
In this regard, all corporate entities, should dispense with this belated ritual . Arguably, time is of the essence and, there can only be so many tasks that can be reasonably completed in a work-day. Yet, it is my opinion that if enterprises prioritize people, people will similarly prioritize those enterprises.
However, ghosting is not exclusive to potential employer-employee dynamics. As an SME owner or manager, I beg you, please do not “ghost” your clients and instead, politely acknowledge and respond to their concerns in a timely manner. Likewise, kindly do not “ghost” your creditors, supporters, members of the inquisitive public and even rival businesses, by bearing in mind the simple adage that, you have to treat with others in the same manner you would wish to be treated.
In this regard, I would suggest that, you remain a cut above the fray by actively demonstrating how and why your business, is refreshingly different from others. It matters precious little what “everybody else” is doing, because at the end of the day, people will generally forget what you do, but, they will usually never forget how you treat them.
As long as you’re alive, stop ghosting. Choose to be a phenomenal host instead.
Keywords: LinkedIn Local Caribbean, ghosting, entrepreneur, employer, job applicant