E-Mail Leadership

E-Mail Leadership

“I’m checking my e-mail.”  Admit it; you have said it or you have heard it from a supervisor or co-workers.  The perception of e-mail in the workplace is that it’s an effective tool for communication and equals productive work.  In this essay I will introduce you to the darker side of e-mail; it is a time consuming beast and leads to a loss of productivity in the workplace.  

“E-mail, which appeared in 1981, became popular far more quickly, reaching 10 million users in little more than a year.” (Sawyer 17)  The popularity of e-mail can’t be questioned, but why is it so popular?  Why do supervisors in particular, find e-mail to be an effective tool of communication?  I offer to you, that the improper use of e-mail is the faceless communication of a coward, not a good leader.  E-mail allows the sender to avoid any possible confrontation or discussion about the content of an e-mail with the recipient.  Keyboard courage becomes a normal extension of the person, allowing them to type what they could never say to a person face to face.

“Worse, e-mail is rarely the best medium for addressing the issues and opportunities at hand. It brings us quick questions that don’t have quick answers; long, informative rambles with no clear action steps; conversation chains with too many people cc’d and many of them offering oversimplified opinions. And that’s on a good day.” (Hughes)  One of the many problems with e-mail in the office place is the improper use of it.  Too many times e-mails will be forwarded to another member of the office with only an FYI, (For Your Information), typed above the original e-mail or even worse, FYA, (For Your Action).  In the latter instance, the original e-mail recipient forwarded an actionable item with no additional instructions.  This type of non-leadership is prominent in the workplace and reduces the productivity of the office.  The last recipient is then trapped with the project and must waste precious time inquiring about intent or the expectations of the supervisor because he or she did not express it with their FYA comment.  

Your e-mail is constantly under a bombardment of superfluous carbon copy, (CC), e-mails.  Projects and discussions that fall under the same department supervisor, but have different teams assigned to them, receive CC e-mails pertaining to all projects and departments.  The result is a loss of man hours while one must search through useless and uninformative e-mails to find the ones that do pertain to their job or project.

“This was when I grasped the most damaging cost of thoughtless e-mail: It prevents us from doing our best work”. (Hughes)  The hours lost would be better spent on a project, being attentive to the task at hand and using our creativity to solve problems.  I believe Robinson said it best, “Disguised as instruments of productivity, they are subverting your staff's most precious resource: attention. Incessant e-mail alerts, instant messages, buzzing BlackBerrys and cell phones are decimating workplace concentration. (Robinson)