We live in an era of smart phones and stupid people

Here’s a thought: if the invention of the cellphone was revolutionary then how would the invention of the smartphone be classified? This week I am back online to talk about how the rise of the smartphone has affected how we do business. Think back to a time before smartphones, even before laptops and tablets, now. If you were waiting for a “make it or break it” message and had to check your email, what were your options? It was not a possibility to check it on the go at that time. You would have to wait until you were somewhere with access to a computer and then check it at that time.

An interesting fact about my family is that my parents were some of the first people to form an eBay account when the website started. At that point computers were not even hugely popular and our internet was dial-up so if you were on the phone you could not use the internet and vice versa. As the internet evolved eBay evolved with it causing my parents to adjust along with it. There were instances before smartphones that one of my parents would be in the hospital with no way to connect to their shop, so the responsibility fell on the other. Once laptops became popular we were able to bring a laptop into the hospital, but our parents were relying on us to do that. Then, the age of smartphones kicked off which gave them the ability to use the web browser to stay on top of things and eventually apps took the stage and became more efficient over time. Smartphones impacted my life more than others because that eBay store became a large part of my family’s livelihood and shaped how we were able to live. Below is a picture of myself and my dad on the day I graduated from my undergraduate program, my mother being the person taking this picture on, you guessed it, my iPhone.

In current times it is almost standard for employees to be issued cellphones for their job if they need to be contacted anywhere other than their office. In my two most recent jobs I was issued a cellphone at each job – and each job chose to distribute iPhones. Were they brand new? Definitely not, but because of the evolving nature of the smartphone they had to be recent enough models to function on the iOS system at the time. Did they function enough for me to check my email while I am at an offsite meeting? Yes. It has almost become an expectation in my career that I will have to be reached any time I am away from my office – which is fairly often due to the nature of my job. But this expectation for a work smartphone causes an issue: separating work and home. When I was managing Relay for Life events I had people calling me at all hours, no matter how many times I explained that I was not on-call, and emails constantly streaming into my inbox. I would be on a date with my husband or eating dinner then all of sudden my phone is ringing, and I am dealing with work when I should be enjoying my time away from work. I could not turn off my phone in case of some emergency and if I did not answer then volunteers would just keep calling or texting until I answered.

The nature of the “work phone” infiltrated my home life and even on holidays I would still be caught replying to emails when I was being paid to be at home. It was like the “immediacy of ideas” that Jan Chipchase mentions in his TEDtalk discussing the anthropology of the smart phone. I was constantly connected to those managing me as well as those that I managed. Jan Chipchase mentions in the same sentence about the speed of ideas and how quickly hey go around. If a volunteer had an idea in the middle of the night for a fundraiser I was the person on the receiving end of their immediacy and was expected to execute the idea with speed. While some of the time I had to realize the blame was on myself for answering the phone and letting work and home mingle together but I also knew that 100 percent of the time I was expected to immediately and efficiently execute a plan for the idea. My job description never said “on-call” but you could say that was the fine print under “other duties as assigned”. I have inserted a selfie I took of myself, my husband, and our dog Alphonse at an event for my job last year. 

Employers also attempt to use smartphones to keep employees engaged. By distributing smartphones to those whose job needed them they were giving employees the opportunity to have access to their work anywhere. No matter where I go my job can get information to me at the literal click of a button. According to an article published by NEHRA News, the tech analyst group Gartner predicted that by the end of 2014, 80% of businesses will support a workforce using tablets. the end of 2014, 80% of businesses will support a workforce using tablets. As we are now in 2018 I look back to 2014 and I believe Gartner was absolutely correct. The mobile tech industry has been booming since then and shows no sign of stopping, just evolving and improving. In 2018 we now have phones that I can just say a keyword and ask it any question, smartphones that help me navigate new cities, and smartphones with Bluetooth capabilities that connect to the speakers in my Fiat so when I’m driving I do not have to even touch my phone. NEHRA News also talks about computer versus mobile company intranets and how little intranets are used by employees. My current job is an excellent example of their point about intranets. The company I work for has had a desktop accessible intranet for very many years but just this year switched to a mobile app version of the intranet. I can tell you with 100 percent honesty that I tried using the intranet ONCE on my smartphone given to me by my job and it was such a mess trying to use it on the iPhone web browser that I gave up without finishing what I was trying to do. Even employees who did not have work assigned phones but used their personal phones for work (in exchange for a stipend) hated trying to use the intranet on a mobile device. Then, recently this year our Information Services department launched an app specifically for our company intranet that was pre-loaded onto work phones and available for download on personal phones. I cannot emphasize enough how much easier an app intranet was for me to use and actually help, not hinder, my job when I was out of the office. This single solution created more engagement from employees and more satisfied employees now that they did not have to try five different times to log in only for the intranet to constantly boot them back out. I can say that on a personal level that now only has the smartphone made my job easier, but it truly has made me more engaged with the organization by being able to so easily access the information that I need.

Smartphones have made it so that I can get my job done anywhere that it is acceptable to use smartphones in public, which according to a study by the Pew Research Center does not include family dinner, church, or the movies. But you get my point that nearly anywhere I went my work was able to come along with me. To be honest, it is nice to disconnect from my job sometimes and leave the smartphone on the counter Tuesday night instead of in my purse and ready to strike with a notification “ding!” at any minute. Some days I just want to use my smartphone to take a good selfie or capture memories of my nephew's first birthday and not for solving a work crisis.