Using Digital Communication Tools Effectively

The answer is not another tool, it is a rule per channel, agreed out loud in the first session and repeated once.

A version that works: one channel for arranging and short questions, one for anything that has to be findable later, and video for the sessions themselves. Then say what response time each carries. A message is not an emergency line and email is not read at the weekend. Saying that plainly protects both of you, and it protects her from thinking silence means something.

The habit that fixes your specific problem is closing each session the same way. Three lines: what we decided, who does what, when we next speak. Send it in the channel she actually reads. It takes two minutes and it means the agreement lives in one place instead of being reconstructed from four.

One thing worth adding for anyone writing this into a programme rather than just their own practice. If you need shared language for what digital competence means, DigComp is the European reference and it is not only about tools. The current version, DigComp 3.0, sets out 21 competences in five areas: finding and evaluating information, communication and collaboration, content creation, safety and wellbeing, and problem solving, described at four levels from basic to highly advanced.

It is useful here because it lets you say which competence a mentee needs next without turning it into a judgement about her. Managing a conversation across channels sits squarely in communication and collaboration, and it is a skill like any other rather than something people either have or lack.