Page 439 - Fundamentals of Management Myths Debunked (2017)_Flat

438 Part 4 • Leading
case applIcatIon 2
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Banning E-Mail. Banning Voice Mail.

t’s estimated that the average corporate user sends and how much e-mail employees send and receive. His approach
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receives some 112 e-mails daily. That’s about 14 e-mails started with the firm’s interoffice communication system, which
Iper hour, and even if half of those don’t require a lot of time became an internal social network, with elements of Facebook,
and concentration, that level of e-mail volume can be stressful work group collaboration software, and an employee bulletin
and lead to unproductive time. board. And then there’s Thierry
Once imagined to be a time- What IS necessary for Breton, head of Europe’s
saver, has the inbox become largest IT firm, Atos. He an-
a burden? What about voice organizational nounced a “zero e-mail policy”
mails? Are phone messages communication? to be replaced with a service
even necessary for organiza- more like Facebook and Twitter
tional communication? These combined.
and other concerns are forcing many organizations to take a The latest casualty in organizational communication choices
closer look at how information is communicated. is voice mail. Under pressure to cut costs, several large financial
Several years ago, U.S. Cellular’s executive vice presi- institutions, including J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., Citigroup Inc.,
dent implemented a ban on e-mail every Friday. In his memo and Bank of America Corp., are deleting or cutting back on
announcing the change to employees, he told them to get out phone voice mail. Some company executives explaining their
and meet the people they work with rather than sending an actions cite the reality that few people use voice mail anymore.
e-mail. That directive went over with a thud. One employee The question remains, however, whether customers still expect
confronted him saying that Ellison didn’t understand how much to be able to maintain voice contact with their financial advisors.
work had to get done and how much easier it was when using e-
mail. Eventually, however, employees were won over. Forced to Discussion Questions
use the phone, one employee learned that a coworker he thought
was across the country was, instead, across the hall. Now, other 13-18 What do you think of this? Do you agree that e-mail and voice
executives are discovering the benefits of banning e-mail. mail can be unproductive in the workplace?
Jessica Rovello, cofounder and president of Arkadium, 13-19 Were you surprised at the volume of e-mail an average
which develops games, has described e-mail as “a form of busi- employee receives daily? What are the challenges of dealing
ness attention-deficit disorder.” She found herself—and her with this volume of e-mail? How much e-mail would you say
you receive daily? Has your volume of e-mail increased? Have
employees—putting e-mail in the inbox ahead of everything you had to change your e-mail habits?
else being worked on. What she decided to do was only check 13-20 What do you think of the e-mail “replacement” some busi-
her e-mail four times a day and to turn off her e-mail notifica- nesses are using—more of a social media tool? In what ways
tion. Another executive, Tim Fry of Weber Shandwick, a global might it be better? Worse?
public relations firm, spent a year preparing to “wean” his em- 13-21 What role should customer service play in choosing which
ployees off their e-mail system. His goal: dramatically reduce organizational communication methods to use?