Transparency, Leadership and Values

In today’s hyper-connected business world, we hear constantly about the need for transparency, leadership, and values. Yet one quietly corrosive behavior that I see all around me continues to undermine all three of those values: ghosting service providers.

When agents cut off communication with consultants, freelancers or contractors, or when they start using someone else without saying a word to someone with whom they've worked for awhile or a long time, they may see it as a minor convenience. In reality, this behavior carries broader social consequences that ripple far beyond a sincere text or email that gets totally "dropped for dead", or a project that appears on the MLS that we didn't create.

1. It Normalizes Avoidance Over Accountability

Healthy markets rely on trust and communication. When businesspeople choose silence over even a slightly challenging conversation, they model avoidance as an acceptable professional strategy. That norm is currently spreading to every area of human relations and it's a sickness.

If a real estate agent engages in avoidance over even the most benign reach-out from someone such as me over Instagram, FB or email, it contributes to a culture cascading downward - avoidance at the top becomes disengagement everywhere. After all, business ecosystems thrive on accountability, and ghosting erodes it.

2. It Creates Financial Instability for Small Operators

Many service providers—consultants, creatives, coaches, independent contractors—operate on very thin margins. A vanished client can create real financial strain and is actually cruel.

When ghosting becomes common practice, it shifts risk unfairly onto smaller, less powerful players in the economy; the message is clear: those with leverage don’t need to communicate, and those who are reliant on their clients must absorb the consequences.

Over time, this discourages entrepreneurship. Talented professionals may avoid independent work not because they lack skill—but because they cannot rely on basic professional courtesy.

3. It Damages Mental Health and Professional Confidence

Silence is psychologically destabilizing. Unlike clear rejection, ghosting provides no closure. Service providers are left questioning:

• Was the work inadequate?

• Did something go wrong?

• Should I have handled that differently?

This ambiguity drains cognitive and emotional energy, people! Multiply that experience across industries, and you create a workforce operating under chronic uncertainty.

In a society already struggling with burnout and anxiety, normalizing professional disappearance compounds the problem.

4. It Weakens the Fabric of Trust in Markets

Markets are not just transactional systems; they are relational ones. Trust reduces friction; Trust accelerates innovation; Trust actually lowers costs.

When ghosting becomes routine, people compensate by over-lawyering agreements, demanding upfront payments, or refusing flexibility. Contracts grow thicker. Collaboration grows thinner.

The invisible cost? Slower innovation, higher transaction costs, and more defensive business practices.

5. It Reflects a Broader Cultural Drift

We often attribute ghosting to digital communication culture—short attention spans, overflowing inboxes, remote work detachment. But business leaders and business owners shape culture. They do not merely reflect it.

Choosing honest conversation—even when uncomfortable—signals maturity and respect. It strengthens reputations. It models ethical leadership.

Silence, by contrast, may feel expedient - however, expedience without integrity carries a social price.

A Simple Alternative

Not every partnership works. Many people in the Treasure Valley seem to be operating on the "Ross Dress for Less" mentality. The reasonable cost of doing business is viewed as excessive or suspicious (eye roll).

But a brief, direct message—“We’ve decided to change things up and/or move in a different direction”—costs little and restores dignity to the exchange. It preserves trust, even in separation.

If we want resilient markets, sustainable entrepreneurship, and healthier professional communities, we must normalize courageous conversations over convenient silence.

Ghosting may seem small, but its consequences are NOT.