The power of small gestures
My last Saturday AM was very atypical. The call came in at 6AM informing me of a devastating earthquake in Chile where most of my family resides. I have lived through many earthquakes and thus I am intimate with all the facts around them. I have studied them, analyzed them and like most Chileans, have learned to live with them and dare I say dismiss them. This call from a Chilean friend was different. “This is a big one”, she said with a disconcerting shake in her voice as she also announce its magnitude “an 8.8.” Upon hearing these facts I went into emergency response and frantically and simultaneously turned on the TV, mobile phone and my PC. I accessed Facebook and twitter and started to seek information via the web, text, TV, all mediums. I called on the fixed line to try to reach my parents, both in their mid 80’s. I redialed several times; it was still early I told myself, so the lines will probably not yet be saturated. On the third try I did reach them. All is good and the family is all alright. Most live in Santiago where the damage was minimal.
Then as the day progressed phone calls, emails, text’s, posts on Facebook, etc…starting to stream in from friends and even acquaintances asking if all was all right. “All was alright”, was the standard response with and added and heart felt:” thank you for reaching out.” These small and easy gestures were huge and I thank all of you for doing them.
This of course got me thinking about the immense power of communications to convey a sense of connectedness. As we all go about our busy lives processing massive and ever increasing amounts of information, knowing that someone took a bit of mental energy to make that connection and to follow it up with an action is indeed a very powerful gesture.
Therein is the power of communication; it is about the action and the feelings that it conveys to the recipient. This is an important truth that all of us in technology and telecom must never forget.
Then as the day progressed phone calls, emails, text’s, posts on Facebook, etc…starting to stream in from friends and even acquaintances asking if all was all right. “All was alright”, was the standard response with and added and heart felt:” thank you for reaching out.” These small and easy gestures were huge and I thank all of you for doing them.
This of course got me thinking about the immense power of communications to convey a sense of connectedness. As we all go about our busy lives processing massive and ever increasing amounts of information, knowing that someone took a bit of mental energy to make that connection and to follow it up with an action is indeed a very powerful gesture.
Therein is the power of communication; it is about the action and the feelings that it conveys to the recipient. This is an important truth that all of us in technology and telecom must never forget.
Comments
You make an important point in your blog that we that are close to the development and deployment of technology habitually miss. We are often blinded by the drive of commerce, to believing that commerce itself is the primary reason and beneficiary of these technologies. We even see these technologies as just profit drivers, and at times as enslaving and dehumanizing. Yet recent an experience show how these technologies can transcend seeking of profit to expand and invigorate human contact when is most needed...
Recently a close friend closed his medical practice in Fairfax, VA for a few weeks to volunteer his services in a medical earthquake relive team in Haiti. During his time in Haiti he was overtaken by depression after he had to amputate a leg of three year old girl that had been entrusted to his care. All his experience and training as a military doctor and private practice could not prevent the sense of helplessness that felt after the operation. He simply broke down weeping and reached for his cell phone. My friend’s wife answer his call in Northern Virginia and join him in his weeping as he express what he was feeling. In the hour that follow his wife contact a number us, his closes friends, and each of us made contact, mostly messaging, with our friend. We express our sorrow for his experience but also our admiration for what he was doing, and our love for him as a friend.
On Wednesday we celebrated the safe arrival of our friend from Haiti. He could not holdback his tears as he express unwarranted gratitude to us for those massages that make him felt love and when he needed it the most.
On reading your blog I suddenly realized that without the technology that sometime we dread, it will have been impossible for us to reach out to our friend when he needed us the most.