Ghosting: Avoiding Discomfort

I recently addressed the topic of ghosting for my coaching clients. In the context of career progression, this is becoming a more common experience from the networking to job search process.

As I mentioned on LinkedIn, a lot of the times people ghost because they’re simply too busy.

But as I reflect more, I think some of the ghosting is also a result of two things:

• People loosing the skill of handling uncomfortable conversations
• People being less and less accepting of others’ decisions/opinions (and moving towards “change their mind” instead of “seek to understand their thought process”)

We have always needed to be part of uncomfortable conversations. But in the past, more of these social interactions were in person, so the option to ignore the conversation was more awkward than seeing the conversation to some sort of conclusion.

This always makes me think of when I was looking for work after being laid off from BlackBerry.

I had interviewed with a scrappy startup that’s now a huge contender in their space. They went with another candidate and I knew it was the right call. Their liaise faire culture with beanbag chairs and beer on tap in the office was not something I could adjust to then (now, however, you may find me with a pint of stout if you’re meeting with me late in the day for anything other than a coaching call).

A few weeks later, the person who interviewed me was at the same art opening as me—and avoided me the entire time.

I didn’t try to press a conversation with her because she was visibly stressed by the thought of having to talk to me. I wondered why she was so worried, especially since I had responded to their decision without complaint or anger.

But what stuck with me more is how unprepared she was for the potential of a conversation with someone who she interviewed and didn’t hire.

Fast forward over a decade, and our environment has become a better facilitator for avoiding uncomfortable conversations.

With more and more conversations taking place by messaging, email or virtual calls (where you can just not show up and don’t have the guilt of someone traveling to meet you), it’s so much easier just to ignore and avoid a conversation.

Even with some of the leaders I coach, we need to work through their challenges with people new to the workplace who will take mental health days after a difficult conversation, then refuse to continue the conversation.

With too much allowance for people to “protect” their mental health, I’m seeing that people are also no longer developing coping mechanisms or other skills needed to navigate difficult situations.

They avoid rather than learn how to navigate the discomfort.

And stay stuck instead of grow.

Not all of us can embrace the idea of Hunting Discomfort, but not all discomfort is a warning of death or danger either.

Then again, I can see why more people are opting to avoid difficult conversations instead of have them.

More and more, conversation seems to be more focused on getting someone to agree with you than to understand each other’s perspective.

It’s like everyone is trying to negotiate with everyone else, using classic (and ineffective) methods like disproving the other’s point or “handling objections”.

And it gets worse when you encounter one of the increasing number of people trying to side-hustle or grow their own business.

So often times the choices are to have a civil conversation and tell someone you’ve decided on another direction (and likely get into a whole conversation about that) or just not reply.