As technology enables innovative ways to connect, it also introduces many challenges too.
Once someone knows your Twitter handle, email address, or phone number, that person can reach out at any time. Add these instances up, and now you’re faced with a huge task of filtering the welcomed contacts from the not.
There’s also the problem around expectations. When someone can reach you, there’s a built-in expectation that you’ll respond. But the increase in outreach volume makes this difficult, if not impossible.
And if the people you want to connect with are on a certain platform, there’s additional pressure to be on it too. And these days, everybody seems to be on everything which creates more issues.
I think the people that have dealt with communication overload the best are the ones that are clear about their boundaries, in terms of what channels they’re willing to use and how they use them. Then it’s up to others to respect those rules.
In short: communicate about how you communicate.