I am a thirty-something, male Information Professional.  Even though I am an experienced manager, I sometimes fall into a very human trap – that of assuming that everyone thinks, acts, and is just like me.  Today’s thought is based upon one of these misunderstandings.

I send a lot of email.  I probably send 25 emails for every phone call that I make.  I use instant messaging, Twitter, and just about every online service that you can think of to get work done. I have a bunch of email addresses and think that it is important enough to be digitally reachable at all times that I pay for my own personal cell phone and data plan. 

The other day, I got into a discussion with a co-worker about email.  They told me that they went all weekend without checking any personal or work email account.  I have not gone more than a day without checking email in years and normally am no more than an arms length from mobile access.  In addition, I send a lot of emails that are nothing more than subject lines.  I don’t even put anything in the body if the subject line can contain the message.  They, on the other hand, did not even display the subject line in their email client, concentrating on the sender as the most important characteristic of the mail. This really got me thinking about the differing assumptions, perceptions, and expectations in different age demographics associated with electronic media and communication usage.

To be clear, I am not suggesting that there is a “right” or “wrong” amount of connectivity to possess.  Nor do I think that everyone should use email at the same frequency.  What I became interested in was how different generations viewed the communications means that they had.  It is important to recognize that there are differences because failure to meet expectations in business or personal relationships leads to misunderstandings.  For example, I expect emails to be acknowledged within about 4 hours, but will completely ignore my phone ringing if I am busy working on a project.  Others tell me that they think I am rude to not answer the same ringing phone because I am showing affront to the person’s time at the other end of the line.  So what does it mean if you ignore my tweet on Twitter?  Should I be upset if you don’t read your email within a day?  If there is no universal etiquette to cover the situation, you had better be very empathetic to detect the subtle variances in expectation in your workplace.

So I went looking online for references addressing this issue.  I decided to focus on Twitter use as the bell weather for the issue.  Here are some items that I discovered:

When the site became popular in early 2007, the majority of its visitors were 18-to-24-year-olds. Today the site’s largest age demographic is 35-to-44-year-olds, who make up 25.9% of its users.

In February 2009, adults ages 35-49 had the largest representation on Twitter, with nearly 3 million unique visitors from this age group. This comprises nearly 42% of the site’s audience.

Twitter.com is a top 50 site that reaches over 23 million U.S. monthly people. The site attracts a young adult, slightly more female than male audience.

The following diagram, cited above as part of the Nielsen story, summarizes the findings on Twitter usage by age:

nielsen-unique-visitors-twitter-age-demographic-february-2009[1] 

By the way, if you use quantcast.com to look-up the age demographics of MySpace and facebook, you will find similar, but even more skewed towards youth, adoption curves.  It is obvious that there is a difference in how age groups adopt, use, and expect others to use web communication methods like Twitter.  I am sure that the adoption curves for services like email, smart phones, and instant messaging would show similar age breaks. 

In conclusion, there is no doubt that age is a primary factor in how you both use communications systems and how you assume others will, too.  I provide this as a cautionary statement, not as a judgment.  You can see that understanding how your actions and assumptions influence your relationships both in business and personally.  For further homework, I recommend that you consciously consider how your usage of communications differs from those you work and live around and with.  These observations should lead to an entirely new level of productivity. 

Do you disagree with me?  Do other factors play more heavily than age?  Do you have personal experience with this trend to share?  Please do.

That is my Information Technology Thought of the Day (ITTOD) for May 21, 2009 ©Scott Coughlin .

Be Sociable, Share!

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.