By Raman Jokhakar, Tarunkumar Singhal, Chartered Accountants
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85 Are you addicted to your
BlackBerry ?
Its nickname, CrackBerry, says it all. There is no
recreational use of Research in Motion’s BlackBerry. It is a compulsive
addiction, or you’re not a user.
Academic studies back up the notion. It found that
a third of BlackBerry users show signs of addiction ‘similar to alcoholics’. The
BlackBerry found its first big pool of users in corporate America. Helping with
productivity and collaboration at work, it lets employees keep up with
colleagues, customers and suppliers even while away from the office.
But, like addicts, users of these devices are not
using the time savings and productivity gains to shorten their work hours.
Instead, they work longer. Glenn Wilson, a psychologist at King’s College
London, found that two-thirds of users check work e-mails out of office hours
and on holidays.
Getting more done, thanks to the speed of
communication, doesn’t necessarily enhance the quality of life.
Wilson found that a compulsion to reply to each new
message led to constant changes of direction, which inevitably tired and slowed
down the brain. The distractions of constant e-mails, text and phone messages
are a greater threat to IQ and concentration, he says, than taking cannabis.
Even those most reliant on this technology worry
about never-ending workweeks and the toll imposed by the constant interruptions
to family life and personal relationships—a result of having this umbilical cord
to work. People are always partly somewhere else, whether at dinner or in bed,
surreptitiously glancing down at the glowing screen and stroking the scroll
wheel.
And the suspicion must be that it is double the
trouble when both partners are constantly connected to Exchange servers more
than to each other—especially among couples dubbed DILS and DINS (for double
income, little sex, and double income, no sex).
One solution : Don’t slavishly respond to every
e-mail. In Europe, it is increasingly considered ill-mannered to read an e-mail
that arrives during a meal, let alone answer it, just as it would be considered
rude to read a book at the table during dinner.
King College’s Wilson found in a clinical trial
commissioned by Hewlett-Packard that one in five of those studied broke off from
meals or social engagements to receive and deal with messages. Although nine out
of 10 agreed that answering messages during face-to-face meetings or office
conferences was rude, one-third nonetheless felt that this had become
“acceptable and seen as a sign of diligence and efficiency.”
Stress and a compulsive addiction to overworking
aren’t solely caused by wireless push e-mail, though it makes it easier to get
hooked. And there is a generation that has grown up expecting to connect 24/7 to
friends and family by e-mail, IM and SMS that can separate work and social
never-severed connectivity.
If you are not one of them, you don’t have to go
cold turkey. Remember, even the CrackBerry has an off button.
(Source : Internet Newswires)
