The Cost of Context Switching: A Strategic Approach to Communication Tools
- Michael Amenta
- Nov 11, 2025
- 3 min read
Updated: Jan 12
We all know that different tools should be used for different jobs—a hammer is great for driving a nail; a saw for cutting things into pieces. But when it comes to communication tools, it seems there's very little understanding of when to use Slack, email, or a meeting.
In the void of established best practices, "synchronous" tools—such as Teams or Slack—have grown in usage because they optimize the user experience for the sender. They get the attention they want most effectively, and since it's the sender who drives usage of communication tools, Slack and Teams have grown.
In addition, the casual nature of Slack removes barriers to using it. Setting up a meeting, making a phone call, and writing an email all require more consideration of whether the communication needs to be made and how it should be crafted. There’s less: “where’d you save that document?” followed by “Found it!” thirty seconds later.
Unfortunately, the pervasiveness of Slack and Teams has been akin to handing every employee a dangerous weapon. With these synchronous forms of communication, the expectation is for a real-time conversation, or at least a response within minutes*. We have all been empowered to demand attention instantly, but we aren't respecting the destructive potential of that power, which has a higher likelihood of increasing the recipient's stress levels and breaking their flow state for over 20 minutes.
The manager's guide to communication tools
It's imperative that the user experience of both the sender and recipient are optimized. So, let's break down how to choose the appropriate of communication tool.
In the guide below, the y-axis conveys the difficulty of the ask for the recipient and the x-axis indicates the objective urgency—the importance of the ask from the perspective of the larger team or organization (not just the sender).
This guideline is most helpful when the request lacks emotional drama or complexity. When either factor is present, it's best to layer meetings and shared documents (e.g. Confluence) into the communication.
For complex topics, prepare a shared document and use regular office hours or a planned catchup time to discuss it. Send the document over email beforehand, and if there are no office hours or regular catchups with the intended recipient, schedule a meeting that includes the document link.
When a topic includes emotions or drama, sincerity and authenticity are very difficult to convey in writing. Depending on the urgency, schedule a meeting or get on the phone to unwind misunderstandings and slights person-to-person.
Unplanned meetings that don't contain an attached document, nor context as to why a meeting is necessary, must be a last resort. That’s because there’s more than one interruption: first, there’s receipt of the invite that adds cognitive load to the recipient ("what is this meeting? should I attend?"), and then there's the meeting itself which often takes significantly more time than consuming information in written channels.
Communication best practices
Working from first principles, the core problem with workplace communication practices today is inefficiency imposed on the recipient. Therefore, managers must:
Encourage removal of all notifications (banners, noises, and indicators) by default from messaging tools and impose a 24-hour standard response time culturally. True emergencies must be designated with high importance tags, or by using a different communication channel for these situations.
Encourage focus blocks free from both Slack and email for several hours a day to limit the impulse to send unnecessary communication and to provide space for flow.
Create policies supporting these practices, and then enforce a culture where agendas, supporting documentation, and call summaries are required practices for meetings. If employees send Slack messages that are not urgent and important, tell them to resend the message in an email.