When I first entered the business world, an advertising agency in London, in the mid-fifties I could write a letter - or more precisely dictate a letter to be typed by a secretary from shorthand - in the morning which would be posted and delivered elsewhere in London by the afternoon of the same day. The recipient would respond and I'd receive his reply (it most often was his since females were confined to the secretarial pool) the next day. Most business was carried out by mail, not telephone. When that changed and the telephone became the favoured option, things began to speed up. I had less time to think about my reply ... and that one move began the remorseless increase in speed necessary to do business - through telex, then fax, then e-mail and so on until there was little time to think and business suffered.
I can relate, Margaret.