The Trend of Texting Through Trainings

I've done it. My partner has done it. I've done it with my partner while she was in the same training with me. I fall asleep in most meetings. Literally just doze off while the person upfront drones away. I learned to sit in the center of the front row if I wanted to stay awake. Why do we do this to ourselves and our employees?

As a manager I sent my team to a number of trainings that they got nothing out of. They returned saying it was interesting and useful, but they did not return with passion to make a change. It was a waste of time, money and resources to send them to most of those trainings. Why? Because people often don't pay attention to the trainings. I don't really blame them, it's boring.

Vice President Cheney gets bored sometimes too.

I certainly don't want to sit through another 2 hour seminar where I watch a 45 minute video of an ex-celebrity tell me about the value of customer service. I sleep right through them. Or I used to, now I can stay awake through the marvelous invention of texting. I get to stay awake and engaged with people all over the world as I text myself through hours of training being paid for by whoever my current employer is.

This needs to stop. I know, this could just be a rant to get people to hire me to do the very things I am talking about, but the fact is the reason I want to do this is my passion for the idea. Not just helping people stay awake, but helping people change their corporate climate. This was pulled from an article about a similar topic in the Mercury News:

"It's increasingly difficult to get people's undivided attention," said Stanford University Professor Pamela Hinds, who studies the effects of technology on groups. "People would argue they are attending to the most important information without any loss of participation, but in fact they aren't fully there."

I know from experience that they aren't fully there. I catch myself texting or checking ym e-mail even at meetings where I really WANT to be there. But it is going to take more than just rules about not having your laptop in a meeting, "going topless" as it is called. It is going to take a change in how we think about our employees, our businesses and ourselves.