Aubyn Hill
RECENTLY SOME business associates and friends were discussing the plethora of blessings (and a few curses) that have been brought to us by the ubiquitous and ever-present cellular telephone.
We eventually got around to discussing what most in the group termed "the growing and disgusting occurrence of the unreturned telephone call" - from all kinds of telephones. We generally agree that there are non-offensive and offensive reasons why people do not return telephone calls. In the non-offensive category fall reasons such as being too busy, forgetfulness, genuinely did not get the message, and these days did not pick up a message from the voicemail system (a system - take note service providers - that quite often does not deliver messages until a couple days after they were received).
The offensive list includes purposely choosing not to return a phone call because the caller is considered to be "below my position or status and will call back if he or she really needs me", laziness on the part of the receiver, or unadulterated arrogance and rudeness due generally to a personality type deficiency.
COURTESY AND ETIQUETTE
In our modern society where so much is done on the telephone - whether it is making arrangements for entertainment, schools, transportation, buying and selling of merchandise, financial transactions, medical appointments, the making of birthing plans for expectant mothers and funeral arrangements for the dead - we will have to extend the normal rules of courtesy and etiquette to the simple telephone and even develop new ones to handle this most useful and even vital instrument.
It is a significant mark of good manners and courtesy to return telephone calls that are missed, especially these days when there is a messaging system on practically all cellular telephones and many land lines. The old excuse that "I didn't get your call" does not cut it any longer. Technology has overtaken that flimsy excuse.
POWER DISSING
I have been in meetings with persons whom others perceive as powerful - and I imagine they think of themselves as such as well - and listened - to them express disregard for a caller on his (usually it's a him) cellphone who, you could detect from the dissing, should not have dared to call the receiver.
I have heard others complain that "such and such (a powerful) person does not return telephone calls" with the clear inference that the receiver of the call thinks too highly of him or herself. Similarly, I have been in meetings where gentlemen of impeccable social etiquette simply demand that cellphones be turned off or put on silent and yet they later either refuse to pick up their messages or return telephone calls. Their impeccable etiquette seems not to extend to the common courtesy of returning a phone call.
A big reason why some people do not return telephone calls is simply to emphasise how powerful they are and their power allows them to pick and choose whose telephone call they will return. They often fail to realise how ephemeral corporate and political power is and can be.
ORDINARY HUMAN BEINGS
On the other hand, some of the most powerful people I know behave like ordinary human beings and do return their telephone calls. Most every minister I know falls into the good category - and the best one or two are really excellent in that they will return your telephone calls by dialling themselves and even using the cellphones of their drivers. They are disciplined and gracious enough to return phone calls - as far as I know to all callers. While I was at National Commercial Bank I attended a function in Montego Bay and chose to give out my private telephone number at the office, which this newspaper published.
I often arrived at the office before my secretary and worked many hours after she has left. Generally in the evenings I received telephone calls from people who would be absolutely astounded that I answered the telephone myself. It was usually easy to find a solution to whatever was the issue or problem of callers. There has to be a few telephone calls that I may not have returned over the years. It is, however, my practice to ensure that I return all the telephone calls I get - even if I do so after a couple of days and after more extended time if I am travelling. Usually, my assistant will inform a caller to the office that I am away and I will return his or her call at a later date.
THE BEST CEOS RETURN CALLS
I have noticed that the relatively new CEO of Cable and Wireless, Rodney Davis, has published the telephone numbers of all his senior executives and himself in full-page advertisements in the daily newspapers.
I know for a fact as well that David Hall from Digicel returns his telephone calls, usually in the day they are received at his office. Davis makes it clear that customers really appreciate the easy telephone access to him and his senior executives and no customer ever abuses the privilege. He also makes the point to all his staff that they had better get it right the first time because every customer - delighted or otherwise - has access to him and his top management team.
The unreturned telephone call is, except in the most exceptional instances, an insult to a caller.
Courtesy and etiquette, not power, arrogance or laziness should be the rationale employed when a call is received and these positive values should force the receiver to return telephone calls. People in positions of authority and power should remember that the only reason a manager or exe-cutive exists is to solve problems. If that were not the case, shareholders would run companies by remote control.
Every manager or supervisor or employee who gets a telephone call when working in a business or in government should see it as his or her obli-gation to return that call as a measure of the service they are engaged to perform - and simply as common decency and courtesy to the caller.
All you powerful and important (self-important?) types pick up your messages and return the telephone calls you may have missed. Today is a great day to start.
Aubyn Hill is the CEO of Corporate Strategies Ltd., a restructuring and financial advisory firm. Respond to: writerhill@gmail.com.
