Let's Think About It Podcast

Digital Overwhelm: Staying Human in a Tech-Saturated World

• Morice Mabry • Season 2 • Episode 46

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Coach Mo welcomes author and communication professor Craig Mattson for a thoughtful exploration of our collective digital overwhelm and how we can reclaim our humanity in technology-saturated environments.

From the moment Craig shares his story about discovering an electronic "buzz in the line" during podcast recordings, we recognize our own experience - that persistent, low-grade distractedness that characterizes modern professional life. His recently published book "Digital Overwhelm" tackles this universal challenge with refreshing honesty and practical wisdom.

What makes this conversation particularly valuable is Craig's balanced perspective. He acknowledges the genuine difficulty of managing our digital lives while offering hope through "communicational flexibility" - developing multiple approaches to workplace technologies rather than relying on a single rigid strategy. Drawing from extensive interviews with millennial and Gen Z professionals, Craig provides insights that benefit everyone from tech-native youth to baby boomers feeling left behind by rapid technological change.

The discussion takes fascinating turns as we explore parenting in digital spaces, helping older professionals adapt to technological shifts, and finding the right relationship with emerging AI tools. Craig's recommendation to "be the human in the loop" with artificial intelligence accredited by author Ethan Mollick, addresses one of today's most pressing workplace concerns with practical, actionable advice.

Whether you're struggling with email overload, concerned about your children's screen time, or wondering how to integrate AI into your professional life without losing your humanity, this episode offers both validation and strategies to move forward. As Craig wisely suggests, try treating digital communication as a gift - an opportunity to slow down, be mindful, and connect authentically despite the technological barriers.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to the let's Think About it podcast, where we embark on a journey of thoughtfulness and personal growth. I'm your host, Coach Mo, and I'm here to guide you through thought-promoting discussions that will inspire you to unlock your full potential. In each episode, we'll explore a wide range of topics, from self-discovery and mindfulness to goal-setting and achieving success. Together, we'll challenge conventional thinking and dive deep into the realms of possibility. Whether you're looking to find clarity in your personal or professional life, or seeking strategies to overcome obstacles, this podcast is your go-to source for insightful conversations and practical advice. So find a comfortable spot, chill and let's embark on this journey of self-improvement together. Remember, the power of transformation lies within you, and together we'll uncover the tools and insights you need to make it happen. So let's dive in. Welcome to another episode of the let's Think About it podcast. I'm your host, Coach Mo, and I'm here with another amazing guest. His name is Craig Mattson. Craig, my man, what's good, buddy?

Speaker 2:

Oh man, what's good is it's probably warmer where you are than it is where I am. I think it's nine degrees here in Grand Rapids. What's it for you?

Speaker 1:

I think we're at 55 here. That sounds livable. Wait, where did you say you're located?

Speaker 2:

The cold, frozen Midwest. Right now Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Speaker 1:

Grand Rapids, michigan, born and raised.

Speaker 2:

I am born and raised in Michigan, but I grew up on the southeast side of the state in a little town called Adrian, between Toledo, ohio and Detroit.

Speaker 1:

So you're a Midwest guy to heart? Yeah, you got it. That's nice, man, that's nice. So tell us who you are, what you do, the value you bring to people.

Speaker 2:

Oh, yes, okay, Thank you, coach Moe, for having me on your show. I'm really grateful to have a seat at your table. So I am a writer, I'm a teacher and I'm a researcher. So, as a writer, I just published a book called Digital Overwhelm which I'm here, happy to talk about with you tonight or today, whatever the time zone is. And I am also a professor, so I teach communication and media production at Calvin University in Grand Rapids and I am I'm a researcher, I like to figure stuff out, so that's a big value for me. You ask what values I bring sense-making, figuring stuff out, that's huge for me.

Speaker 1:

Professor, researcher, writer, in in this digital age what are you researching and how is this digital age impacting our workforce?

Speaker 2:

I've looked into your work a bit and I've noticed that you pay a lot of attention to you're trying to help people grow and develop and you help them deal with problems like and I noticed this was something that was listed in one of your concerns the inner critics that we all have, the little strange creature in our head that is saying you can't do it, man Can't do it, woman Can't do it. So a really quick story I'm also a podcaster, like you, as who isn't? These days, everybody seems to have a podcast. But I was listening, I was editing a podcast and I kept hearing this buzz. I was like what? I don't remember any problems in the line when I was recording with the guests or the other participants in this podcast, but there was this weird persistent buzz.

Speaker 2:

So I went to an engineer in the building building and I was like what is this? And it takes some detective work to figure it out. But he said do you have any devices that are right next to your soundboard while you're recording? I don't think so, but I'll check it out. Sure enough, coach Mo, I had a smartphone sitting right next to the soundboard and that little device created the buzz in the line and I think for so many working professionals today. Our smartphones, our social media, our devices of all kinds create a buzz in the line for us. We're just like constantly. We have this low grade distractedness at all times, and so I think my research has been trying to make sense of those kind of working conditions, whatever your organization or company.

Speaker 1:

So what does that mean and what type of value do you bring through your different types of research that you do?

Speaker 2:

I hope that the value I'm bringing to people is partially just awareness that they are digitally overwhelmed we all are.

Speaker 2:

It's a part of life today, a huge part of it. So awareness is a huge thing. I know that's important in your work too. You're trying to help people be aware of some of the voices inside their heads or some of the ways that they're shooting themselves in the foot and ways that they could grow and develop, and I have similar ambitions. My research has mostly paid attention to organizational communities, to working communities, and I've basically been asking how is it that we can have org communities where people can stay human despite all the digital overwhelm? So I think that's a value I'm looking for. So how do you pursue that? My book discusses six what I call modes of communication, modes of digital communication, and I try to show people like what each mode is good at and then maybe what it's not so good at, and then to help them have more than one available approach to communication in working life today.

Speaker 1:

Okay, let's take a step back then with the book. What's the name of it and what's that propelled you to want to write a book and went into that process before we get into this stuff?

Speaker 2:

Sure, yeah, it's a good question. Why would anybody want to write a book? It's just a pile of a lot of work. It's a lot of loneliness and a lot of I'm never going to get this done. Why did I even start this? Yeah, there's a lot of that, but I probably am a writer because I'm a compulsive language guy. I really like language, I really like words and I like the possibilities that open up when a book shows up in the world. Who knows whose hands that's going to show up in and what kinds of relationships can open, even like the one we're having right now. I could never predict it.

Speaker 2:

I got into this project in the middle of the pandemic and I started randomly podcasting with former students, kind of a check-in. I was a little bored. I was like what's going on for you, how are things going? And the stories they started to tell me about working life were stunning and I said, oh my gosh, I got to open a study on this and that's how this book began. I interviewed dozens of rising professionals among Gen Z and millennial working folk and asked them how they were coping, how they were dealing with all the intensities of the time, and this book sprang out of that.

Speaker 1:

Wow, what's the name of the book?

Speaker 2:

Digital Overwhelm.

Speaker 1:

Digital Overwhelm yeah, Wow, Okay. When I hear that title Digital Overwhelm I'm thinking there's too much social media, TV, smartphones, everything's coming at me. How do I navigate and get back to the roots of how I was raised without all of this, but still can use it by my choice, but able to navigate how I once did navigate? And how do I cope with the overwhelming feelings that I experience with all of this technology that's being bombarded into my awareness that I'm trying to resist?

Speaker 2:

Is that a?

Speaker 1:

good assessment.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it sure is. That's great, you've named it, you've named the predicament we're all feeling.

Speaker 1:

Okay, okay. So with your research, what does that look like in how you help people overcome the overwhelming feeling in this digital space that we've so often experienced? What does that research look like for the product?

Speaker 2:

Yes. So I think one of the takeaways from this research is it's okay to be overwhelmed. We should just face up to the fact that it is too much what you just described. There's nobody who can finesse all of that and master it and look cool in the process. It is just a lot, and so that's a takeaway for me. Just frankly admit, yeah, this is more than I can easily manage. Maybe also some sense of hope and the in the possibilities of connection with other people. Even I love the way your podcast like slows us down a bit and we just take this time to talk.

Speaker 2:

Let's think about it, man, we're thinking about it. Let's think about it. When do we ever do that? When do we ever just stop and say, yeah, what is going on here? So I think that's one thing, and then I think another way to put like a takeaway from my research is cultivate communicational flexibility. Communicational flexibility Don't get stuck in a particular way of interacting and think it's this way or it's no way. So my book is exploring six at least ways of practicing communication in the workplace in digital spaces, and so flexibility is a big one for me.

Speaker 1:

Now, this is a good conversation because I think, working in a hybrid remote setting my phone, it's like right here, it's right here, and I'm easily distracted when a notification comes in, I just oh, okay, yeah, the constant negativity through the social media, the politics and things that's happening right now in politics, right, and the me's, all of these different type of comments, it consistently popping up, whether it's on my phone, whether it's on the tracker meter at the bottom of your TV. It's always something and I'm just being bombarded Through your research and you've done you work in this space. How do you help people overcome that? How do you help people get back to put the phone down, break away from that, go back to your roots. Let's step away from the electronics. What do you do to help people in that sense?

Speaker 2:

One of the first things I do in this book is to offer some historical perspective. We're not the first people in human history to be overwhelmed by technological change. So this is going to sound strange, but even 2,500 years ago there was a late-breaking technology that made people very nervous the way artificial intelligence makes many of us very nervous today and it was called a pen, a writing implement, and the philosopher Plato wrote about writing and how uneasy he was as he thought about what writing would do to learning, to conversation, to thinking. Let's think about it. He was uneasy about that. He wasn't alone. So we're not the first people to deal with technological change.

Speaker 2:

But the second thing that I try to help people do is to sit back and think about their goals a bit, especially in the workplace. You want to be with other humans, what kind of organizational community are you really hoping and anchoring for? And those sort of diagnostic questions then lead me into the particular gifts and challenges of each mode of communication. So I can't give you like a generalized answer, because the wisdom that you need for a Zoom conversation like we're having right now is different from the wisdom you need for an email interchange or a text chat or a Slack message or what to do when your technology breaks down, which it does all the time. So what I do in my book is I try to explore different digital spaces where we find ourselves. I isolate them a little bit and say let's think about this particular space for a little while. And how can we stay human in our inboxes, and how can we stay human in the Microsoft Teams meeting and so forth?

Speaker 1:

How can I stay human when using technology? How can I help my kids remain human when they were born, into this age where we pick up the phone and we look at the phones, where kids don't want to go outside and play football, basketball at the park. They rather sit on their phone and connect with their friends through text messaging and apps and things like that. As parents, how do we help normalize our kid from the digital age for just small segments of time? What?

Speaker 2:

I love about your question is that you're recognizing we're not just one thing right. We're always multiple things. We're professionals, but we're also colleagues, we're also friends, we're also neighbors, we're also parents many of us and so each of those vocations bring with it their own sort of questions and challenges, and the parenting one is really hard. I was interviewing people who were talking about their workspaces, but it was interesting how often kids came up, how often not so much among the Gen Z people I was talking to, but certainly among the millennial professionals. Yeah, digital life and children it's a complex intersection.

Speaker 2:

I think your advice to go outside and play is a great one, and I think the good news is that many young people today are I don't know I'm hearing rumors of this that they're just getting fed up with social media. It's just it's bringing a lot of nastiness into their streams of consciousness, and I've seen this with my own kids as well, that there's sometimes drawing harder lines. I'm just not going to do that sort of lines. So that gives me some hope. Like, sometimes the kids just figure this stuff out. They're like they figure out what's good for them and what's not, certainly with mentoring and guidance too.

Speaker 2:

But the other thing I would do as a parent, when your kids don't seem to be like drawing those boundaries in good ways ways, is just to ask what are you doing with that, what do you use that for? And then I think, as you hear them reflect, you can have a better sense of how to intervene on their overuse of tech. But even better if you can get them to talk about what they're doing with the media, or what they think they're doing with the social media or the digital media. It just gets them to hear it themselves, gets them to be reflective and mindful, which is finally what we want from our kids. We want them to be more aware, more mindful of what they're trying to do, what they want to do.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, that's a good point.

Speaker 2:

Do you want to push back on that at all?

Speaker 1:

No, no, no. As you were talking, another thought came up on the other spectrum. Yeah, I'm going to go to the workplace, I'm going to go to the space of being a baby boomer. Okay, I've been in my role for the past 15, 20 years. Technology is changing. Oh my God. How can I keep up? I can't keep up. This is nuts. Why, why can't this slow down? What is it going to do for my business? Things like that. How do you approach it from that lens? To help someone in that overwhelming feeling as a leader now, feeling that they can't keep up with all the changes in technology? What do I do? How do I navigate this? Does your book offer insights? Do how do I navigate this? Does your book offer insights? Examples around that perspective.

Speaker 2:

I wrote the book as a Gen Xer and I really thought that I was doing this research and it would be about other people. I thought this would be about those people that I'm interviewing or those people that I'm talking to, that I'm meeting in coffee shops with or talking to on a Zoom call, and it turned out Coach that I was. I don't know. It was about me too. So I appreciate your question. There were points where I really wanted to do this research in order to escape digital overwhelm and I found I couldn't do that. No, I'm in the midst of it, like the people I was interviewing. So that's why I like your question so much. I think it's important to say we're all in this, even those of us who remember a time before the smartphone, or remember a time when we only had a flip phone or only a landline. Even we with that sort of complex perspective still face this. I guess for older readers of the book, who I would love to have managers say I'm trying to figure the kids out these days, so I'm going to read that book I think that would be great. But for those people I would say two things. One, listen to your Gen Zs, listen to your millennial professionals, see what they're thinking, Consult with them, ask their advice, ask what sense they're making of things. By pulling people into the organizational conversation and somewhat even into the decision-making of your organization, I think you empower them, you strengthen them and you learn from them. You learn from what they are native to in ways that people like you and me aren't exactly so.

Speaker 2:

That's my first piece of advice to an older reader or an older leader in a company, and I think my second one is going to sound similar to what I said earlier, and that is you never really stop needing yoga. You always need to be flexible. No matter how long you've been in the business, you still need flexibility because the ground conditions change under your feet all the time, and so getting good at cognitive and maybe literal yoga and relational yoga, being able to stretch and bend and be supple and flexible I don't know like old age still requires it or older age still requires that sort of flexibility. So I think that's my second recommendation Do some yoga.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, no, that's great. I was thinking, as you were talking, being a coach that I am, and someone came to me and that was a topic that came up. The first space that I would take them is through self-awareness, right and meaning. Let's acknowledge your uncomfortability, the overwhelming feelings that you have around this digital space. You're not the only one that feels that way. Let's acknowledge that right. And then the next thing is acceptance. You don't like it.

Speaker 1:

It's okay to feel the way that you feel in this moment around the digital space. Anyone who's been through the way that you've been through in your life would probably feel exactly the same way that you feel it's all good, right, yeah. Then the next question I ask what steps do we need to take to move forward past this emotional feeling that you have towards digital age? What actions need to take place? Yeah, so now it's not so much around the frustration that I'm feeling about the digital age that I'm in Now.

Speaker 1:

I'm thinking what are the possibilities in a desire space and how I can live in this digital space, and that's a coaching approach in which I would take someone through that frustration and feeling, Because when you have that, people want to normalize their situation and in that moment of feeling frustrated that I'm being left behind in this digital age, I feel as though I'm the only one that's being left behind and I carry that burden right. And so the acknowledgement aspect is just, it's okay, you have a right to feel exactly how you're feeling. No one walks your shoes the way you walk your shoes. It's just, it's okay. You have a right to feel exactly how you're feeling. No one walks your shoes the way you walk your shoes.

Speaker 1:

It's all good, get it out. That's the next steps, yeah.

Speaker 2:

Your story, or your coaching approach, reminds me of something I heard from one of my interviewees, and he happened to be working on a UPS floor, like a warehouse floor, so he was talking about his experience of technological breakdown, like when things don't work, which happens a lot, and he said that there are sometimes external expectations placed on him because he's a guy, because of his gender, and he said it didn't necessarily make any sense because he's not. Nobody is completely competent with every tool that gets put in front of them, right, but sometimes people just would expect him to be competent in ways that nothing in his background prepared him for, and for me that's become a way, a frame for a lot of people's experience. I think we're expected to be able to do a lot of things and we're all on this enormous learning curve all the time. So I think that's important to give yourself grace. I think your coaching is helping people to do that. Acceptance yes, accept yourself and the history that you have.

Speaker 1:

And I think also as you're learning new technology. I think the frustrating piece of it is, once you master a certain technology, right when you feel you got it, you're comfortable, something new comes on and you got to adjust again. A cycle of continual adjustments that needs to be made day in and day out.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, you've said it, You've absolutely said it, and sometimes it just gets to be way too much. I have, I do want to help people to be flexible, to be self-accepting, to give themselves grace and give other people grace. I think that's enormously important. I think there's also a place for protest and complaint, because I don't know the people who are designing this tech. They don't usually consult with us. They don't usually ask us if we want some new development. It just shows up and then suddenly it becomes a mandate that we all have to become proficient in this thing. I don't know, coach, Like sometimes I just want to say no, no, thanks. I don't want that in my life and I wonder if organizationally, if there might be. I'm not talking about being frumpy and unwilling to change. I'm just talking about saying how much change should we be doing? How much does our organization actually need to fulfill its mission and not just bringing something onto the table simply because it's there?

Speaker 1:

Let me ask you this Through your experience what's the buzz around chat, GPT and its impact in organizations? What's that buzz looking like through your research?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it feels like when you're at a pool party and some really big guy comes running down the deck and jumps into the pool and the water just splashes everywhere. That's what it's like right now. We're all drenched by this big cannonball that has landed in the midst of our lives in the past couple of years. And I teach at a university and I don't know. Some days I don't know what the hell I'm doing. Like. What does it mean to grade things right now? What does it mean to assign things right now when a student can copy and paste an assignment description into a chat bot and get a pretty decent piece of work in response? So I guess I see a couple of different.

Speaker 2:

From my organizational perspective, I see a couple of different responses to AI.

Speaker 2:

On the one hand, you have the never AI people who are really resistant to it, who just hate it and wish it had never been developed, and on the other end you might have the sort of techno-utopians like this is going to solve all of our problems.

Speaker 2:

I don't see a lot of those at my university, but I think the people I like to hang out with are those who accept artificial intelligence as a given in our time and ask how can we make a space at our table for AI but not give it the whole table at the same time?

Speaker 2:

There's a guy I'd like to follow. His name is Ethan Mollick and he has written a book called Co-Intelligence and he writes quite a lot about artificial intelligence in the workplace and one of his guidelines is be the human in the loop. So AI is going to be in the loop in your organization, it's going to be there, but your job and the job of your team is to, as much as possible, be the human. Not just cede your tasks to AI, not just delegate all your stuff to AI, but instead to say I want to work with this, whatever you want to call it, this technology, this large language network, I wanted to work with this, this, whatever you want to call it, this technology, this large language network, I want to work with it, but there's still stuff that I got to do, there's still attention I have to pay and I'm not going to give that up.

Speaker 1:

What does that look like? When you say work with it, is there an approach outside of just delegating tasks to chat GPT? What else outside of that you mean by work with it?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's a $150,000 question. I think I can. I have a couple of ideas. One thing I try to say to people who I'm coaching about this is don't give up the work of the first draft. You really need the first draft of any project you're working on. You need that time of brainstorming, ideation generation, creative work. You need that in order to get the project into your bones, and if you just hand it over to AI, you'll miss out on some really vital early development.

Speaker 1:

But it's so easy to do that.

Speaker 2:

Because AI can spit out the information.

Speaker 1:

I know, but then it's frustrating that we are involved in all of this AI stuff, so it's a catch-22.

Speaker 2:

I know, I know, I feel it, coach, I feel it. I think there are some situations where I do ask AI to generate something first, to help me to brainstorm about something. For instance, when I'm writing an introduction for a podcast, I often will spend quite a long time writing a prompt. There are four hosts in this podcast. Here's the tone of the podcast. Here's what we're talking about. Here's our tagline.

Speaker 2:

Would you give me a two-minute script and then I go through that script? Oh my gosh, in some ways it's brilliant. It does a lot of the kind of distribution of the script to the various hosts. That's really handy. But the tone is usually off. The vocabulary is usually not super helpful, which might be my fault. I might need to make a better prompt. But there's another danger and that is. Ethan Mollick talks about not falling asleep at the wheel. I think with collaborating with AI, whether you do the first draft or AI does the first draft, you can't fall asleep because artificial intelligence will. It's a pleaser. It really wants to please you, it really wants to guess at what you want and to give you that, and sometimes it will hallucinate in order to do that. It will just make stuff up and sometimes it will be too affirming of your ideas. So yeah, don't fall asleep at the wheel. Keep questioning it, keep thinking with it, keep up all those critical processes.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for that. As we get ready to close out, any lasting thoughts that you would like to share with the audience.

Speaker 2:

I think one final thought that really came to me in working on the problem of email overload, which is a perennial problem for a lot of professionals, is that, as often as you can treat digital communication with another human as a gift, as often as you can I don't think you can do that all the time. I don't think every email you oh goodness, not every email, but maybe every fifth email you can just step back and, as your podcast encourages, let's think about it. Let's give this some time and some mindfulness, let me slow down, and I think not just an email, but in any kind of communication that we're practicing in a digital space yeah, to just say maybe this is an opportunity to sit back for a moment and be the human, and one way to do that is just to recognize the gift that comes with this, and this conversation has been a gift to me, coach. It's been good to slow down and just think about what's going on in our digital workspaces with you, and so this podcast itself is a gift.

Speaker 1:

I appreciate that. Thank you so much, but before we jump off the listeners, find your book.

Speaker 2:

As they say, it's available wherever books are sold. You can also check out my website, which is the Mode Switch. So that's the word the Mode M-O-D-E and the word switch all one wordcom, the mode switchcom. You can find my written materials there and other ways to connect with me, and I would love to connect with your any of your listeners. That would be a real joy to me.

Speaker 1:

There it is, everyone there it is. Thank you, sir. I appreciate you, Craig.

Speaker 2:

Yes, I'm grateful for this time coach. I hope you keep up your good work. Thank you, sir. I appreciate you, craig. Yes, I'm grateful for this time coach. I hope you keep up your good work.

Speaker 1:

Thank you, I appreciate that. Have a great day. Thank you for joining me in this episode of let's Think About it. Your time and attention are greatly appreciated. If you found value in today's discussion, I encourage you to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform. Remember, the journey of self-improvement is ongoing and I'm here to support you every step of the way. Connect with me on social media for updates and insights. You can find me on Instagram and Facebook at Coach Mo Coaching, or LinkedIn at Maurice Mabry, or visit my website at mauricemabrycom for exclusive content. Until next time, keep reflecting, keep growing and, most importantly, keep believing in yourself. Remember, the most effective way to do it is to do it Together. We're making incredible strides toward a better and more empowered you. So thank you and I'll empowered you. So thank you and I'll see you in our next episode.