I remember a song from my youth called McArthur Park, something about leaving a cake out in the rain. I didn’t understand it then and I don’t understand it now. My point? That I wasn’t born yesterday, and yes, there are still things I don’t understand—perhaps never will.

One of those things is the expected time period for receiving and returning correspondence. In the days of my youth, before OS X, heck before computers even, I learned that the appropriate time period to return a letter (you remember something you mailed at the post office) was three to five days. Later, when I took a few business computer course early in my career, I learned if you responded to email and phone calls within 24 hours that was terrific. And if you couldn’t provide the information requested in that time period, a quick “Thanks for your email, I will get back to you on that” as an acknowledgement that you received the request and were working on an answer was a good idea.

But what about text messages and Instant Messages? Just the term “Instant Message” seems to imply you need to be instantaneous in your response. As I like to be thoughtful and accurate, instantaneous doesn’t always work and so I avoid the whole “IM” scene. That leaves text messages. I don’t often send text messages or reply to them because I don’t want people to think I “text” anymore then I “IM”. Why don’t I text? Because I can’t figure out the proper response time. Is it just a short email and the 24 hour rule applies? Is it more like an IM and thus an instantaneous reply is expected? Is it even appropriate to expect people you work with to use and reply to text messages?? So if someone sends me a text message to say they are going to be late for a conference call and I terminate the conference call after 10 minutes thinking they are a no show because I never saw the text message something like a tree falling in the woods with no one there to hear it?

What is the proper use of text messages in the work world? Is it an expectation for everyone?

What do you think??