When Silence Becomes the Answer
A few months ago, I submitted a proposal to a company I'd been hoping to work with for a while. Good fit, strong brief, solid relationship with the contact. I sent it off on a Thursday and heard nothing.
I followed up the next week. I was friendly and brief. Nothing.
Two weeks later, another note. Still nothing.
By week four, I had stopped wondering whether they liked the proposal and started wondering whether something was wrong with me. I felt a sense of indignation and powerlessness that gnawed at my gut.
That's the thing about silence. It doesn't stay neutral for long.
The Leadership Lens
We talk a lot about communication overload, and the problem is real. The average office worker receives around 117 emails a day, and more than half of employees say they spend too much time just crafting and deciphering messages. People are genuinely buried.
But I think something else is going on, and it doesn't get talked about as much.
Technology hasn't just made communication faster, but it’s also made not responding easier. In a face-to-face conversation, silence is immediately visible. In email, it can last days or even weeks. We've built tools that give us permission to delay, and somewhere along the way, we normalized it.
A 2025 study on remote work found that increasing reliance on mediated communication, decreasing face-to-face interaction, and rising workloads have created fertile ground for workplace ghosting practices.
Here's where it gets interesting, though. Research shows that 57% of employees now assume that no response is itself a response. We've essentially taught people to read silence as a decision. But, the deeper issue is what unanswered messages do to the person waiting.
Neuroscience shows that professional ghosting triggers a threat response — activating the nervous system and spreading anxiety — and can erode employee trust rapidly. People can usually handle waiting. What they struggle with is not knowing.
Most people can absorb a "no," or "I don't have an answer for you right now."
The lack of response, on the other hand, leaves the ghosted wondering, “Was it something I said?” or “Do I matter?” Those unanswered questions gets louder the longer they sit. The brain burns excessive energy ruminating on unresolved situations because it can’t achieve closure.
At work, those open loops accumulate. Someone waiting on a project decision starts asking whether the project matters. Someone waiting on feedback starts asking whether they matter.
When employees feel ignored after raising concerns or asking about their future, uncertainty replaces clarity, and over time, uncertainty weakens trust and contributes to disengagement.
Communication overload is real. Most of us are managing more conversations than ever before. But while technology has changed how we communicate, it hasn't eliminated how we manage it or our responsibility to respond. Silence is still a choice, even when it's an unintentional one.
That's not overreaction. That's how trust actually works. Every unanswered message is a small withdrawal from the account.
Untangling Tips
Close the loop, even when you don't have the answer. "Not sure" or "I'll come back to you by Friday" takes ten seconds and stops the clock for the other person.
Acknowledge before you resolve. You don't owe anyone an immediate answer. You do owe them confirmation that their message landed. Those are two different things.
Set response expectations explicitly. If your team works across time zones or asynchronously, name the norms out loud. "I typically respond within 48 hours" removes the guessing game before it starts.
If you’re on the receiving end, don’t let it bring you down. It says more about the other person’s avoidance tendency than you. The ghoster has probably moved on and it’s uncomfortable, but it’s also the exit ramp.
A Closing Reflection
Most workplace ghosting doesn't come from bad intentions. It comes from good people managing too many conversations at once, choosing silence when they don't have a ready answer, delaying when the right words aren't coming.
That's understandable. But intentions don't eliminate impact.
Every unanswered message leaves someone else holding uncertainty. And uncertainty, left long enough, turns into a story. Usually not a generous one.
The fix isn't perfect communication. It's just enough of it to keep the other person from writing a story you never meant to tell.
From the Untangling Communication series — reflections drawn from my work with leaders and the ideas explored in my book, Untangling Communication: How Leaders Can Strengthen Communication, Resolve Conflict, and Build High-Performing Teams. Available on Amazon.
Have your own story of being left on read at work? I'd genuinely like to hear it. Find me on LinkedIn or reply directly.