Has ‘Ghosting’ reached the Workplace?
It hasn’t quite made the Oxford English Dictionary just yet, but you’d struggle to find someone who doesn’t know this new trending word. The term ‘Ghosting’ is well-known in pop culture, more specifically when talking about digital relationships.
The term ‘ghosting’ is used to describe when an individual decides to randomly stop all communication and contact without any apparent warning or reasoning. Sometimes even taking it one step further, and avoiding, ignoring and refusing to respond to attempts to restart conversations.
Most communication can be done virtually which in many cases has catalysed progression. However, as we become ever more reliant on the digital world, we increase the relative anonymity and isolation between every day interactions. Some suggest this is the source of ‘ghosting’ as this makes it easier to behave poorly with little to no social repercussion.
With this type of behaviour becoming more commonplace, individuals reinforce this type of behaviour in all areas of their daily lives including the workplace. This result is frightening.
Some have suggested that it is due to the decline of empathy in society. Along with the promotion of a more selfish, narcissistic culture driven by social media habits. They claim individuals have become desensitised to this type of behaviour. Thus resulting in it being evermore present and creeping into the working environment.
Now, we’re not saying this behaviour is anything new, but it has never been this prevalent.
Most recruiter’s will agree this is a regular expectation that comes with the job, however, moving on from sporadically happening it is now an everyday common occurrence at every stage of the recruitment process. Previously, it seems, the fear of bad first impressions seemed to curb this bad behaviour but for whatever reason that doesn’t seem to be the case.
At Spayse International, we have noticed a significant rise in ghosting in the last few months especially. From both our clients and candidates.
The frustration, aside from the fact this behaviour is fundamentally rude, lies in the unknown. Individuals who ghost are primarily focused on avoiding their own emotional discomfort. They aren’t thinking about how it makes the recipient person feel or the impacts surrounding that decision.
Ultimately, as a recruiter this behaviour leaves us powerless and without a route to ask questions. It leaves us with little avenues to provide and share information that would help fill vacancies and place candidates. It ultimately silences us and debilitates moving forward with any positive outcomes.
Whatever happened to the grown-up conversations of ‘we’re not interested’ or ‘this role isn’t something I want to pursue’. It seems we have lost the art of articulating our discomfort and the ability of having difficult conversations. These may be temporarily uncomfortable however leaving a reputation of rude behaviour will cause much longer discomfort throughout your career.
On the up-side, increasingly we noticed this type of behaviour not tolerated in the digital dating world. So, hopefully in time, this predicts positive news for the workplace as well.
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Get in touch with the Spayse team to discuss your company’s staffing needs – Call 0203 011 0550
Or if you’re looking for work, please email your CV to info@Spayse.com
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