Creative Reaction

As information aggregator Kosmix grew to thirty employees, its team started suffering from e-mail overload and workweek creep; it was time to rethink its communications. Stop Email Overload and Break Silos Using Wikis, Blogs, and IM details their efforts.

It seems Kosmix was relying primarily on e-mail, even for things which e-mail is not well-suited for. (For a primer, look here.) This is sort of thing is often the case with startup companies, where, in my experience, off-the-shelf Macs, procedures and free services “work” without design or strategy, then suddenly buckle under the load as the company grows.

Now at Kosmix, Blogs and RSS feeds are being used for status updates (making many meetings unnecessary!), Wikis are being used for “persistent information”, and IM is being used for live communications from diverse locations.

My second favorite thing is that employees are allowed to set their IM “status” to “Do Not Disturb” when interruptions are especially unwelcome. My favorite thing is that technology being used smartly and is aligned with business needs.

(My only concern as an IT professional is that they are using Yahoo for IM, which is likely not the most secure choice, and there’s no mention of using a VPN to connect to the office.)

I like that there’s a healthy realization that “Kosmix is certainly not the first company to use internal blogs, wikis, and IM for corporate communication” and that “as Kosmix grows further, even this model will break down at some point and (they) will have to look for new communication models.”

The results “have been immediate and very visible. They include a lot less email and almost none on weekends; better communication among people; and 360 degree visibility for every member of the Kosmix team. After we instituted these changes, everyone on the team feels more productive, more knowledgeable about the company, has more spare time to spend on things outside of work.”

Now who wouldn’t want that?!

A follow up on Stephen Shapiro, an author and keynote speaker who while in Asia had his BlackBerry stolen and whom I wrote about on Tuesday. In a post today, he describes his newfound freedom. He checks his e-mail once or twice a day, and leaves the cheap cell phone he bought behind when he goes out. “I’m getting more work done in less time, because I can stay focused on the task at hand, rather than reading and responding to emails every 5 seconds.” Freedom indeed.

Author and keynote speaker Stephen Shapiro had his BlackBerry stolen in Malaysia at the beginning of a three week trip and has been detailing his “withdrawal”. In Stay Connected by Disconnecting he explains the difficulties involved and in CrackBerry Addiction he has had 24 hours to contemplate his dilemma, and decided that periods of “disconnection” are healthy, as they “should improve your productivity, increase your ability to stay focused, enhance your relationships, and reduce your stress”.

Really, you should think before any form of communication, as to whether it’s the best way to convey your message, though Voice Mail has its own particular challenges. Increasingly, many people are avoiding it altogether, especially in corporate settings, as Michael Arrington explains in Think Before You Voicemail. In fact, he declares it DEAD. (Definitely worth reading.)

The biggest issues are Voice Mail’s “linear” nature (unless your have an iPhone) and that it is simply not part of most people’s workflows - it’s easy for Voice Mail messages to fall though the cracks.

A while back, I found some tips on how to leave a perfect Voice Mail message:

1. State your name & company.

2. State your phone number s-l-o-w-l-y.

3. State the date & time (& time zone if different).

4. Make your point across in one sentence.

5. Indicate if the call needs to be returned. If it’s an FYI, say so.

6. Explain when you are available for a callback.

7. Phone number s-l-o-w-l-y again.

8. Consider leaving your e-mail address. If you do, spell it slowly, especially if it does not contain your name.

Considering all the necessary information needed to make Voice Mail work, you’ll have to weigh its efficiency, or lack thereof, for yourself. Most of this information is built into or is simply unnecessary if you instead choose to use e-mail.

In September ‘07 I blogged about which technology is best for various communication needs, which linked to this excellent article. Perhaps today is a good time to review it.

A drawback of technology is constant connectivity and constant workplace interruptions - to the point that many of us have lost our weekends. I came across Take 48! today in which entrepreneur John Battelle details this very struggle; “The weekend is when I catch up on work I can’t get done during the week, in particular work that requires long form thinking”. The result? “In an odd and most likely not very healthy way, the weekends have become two more workdays.”

Battelle, along with two other senior leaders at his company, have made a step in the right direction; they have agreed to not send e-mail (which they rely upon heavily) from 6 P.M. Friday until 6 P.M. Sunday.

The result? “by golly, it really worked… it felt as if (the company), as an institution, was taking time to breathe, to contemplate, to relax and feed itself.”

Reading between the lines, this company really needs to take further steps, though they should be given credit for recognizing a problem and taking action to solve it.

Let’s all aim to limit the workweek to its M-F boundaries, enabling ourselves and our staffs time to think and work within those boundaries. Having evenings and weekends to spend time with our friends and loved ones, and to take care of our responsibilities is what’s best for all and what’s best for our businesses.

“Some of the biggest technology firms, including Microsoft, Intel, Google and I.B.M., are banding together to fight information overload. Last week they formed a nonprofit group to study the problem, publicize it and devise ways to help workers — theirs and others — cope with the digital deluge.”

Kudos to Techdirt for seeing an analogy here between The Simpsons and the above quote from an NYT article (Subscription required, don’t bother; as the article is not very coherent, let me save you some time by regurgitating it.)

We all know the dangers that cell phones, IM, and e-Mail pose to our productivity - primarily that of the constant interruptions. Of course, we already know better than the “typical information worker who sits at a computer all day (and) turns to his e-mail program more than 50 times and uses instant messaging 77 times” (if not, see here and here and here and here) though seeing an actual dollar amount, $650b (billion) in lost productivity, in the United States alone, drives the point home.

So what new technology are we getting? I hope it’s better than this “E-Mail Addict feature” in Gmail, “an experimental feature for the company’s e-mail service that lets people cut themselves off from their in-boxes for 15 minutes”. “Clicking the ‘Take a break’ link turns the screen gray, and a message reads: ‘Take a walk, get some real work done, or have a snack. We’ll be back in 15 minutes!’”. “Those who find they are truly addicted can cheat by hitting the escape key”. Ugh.

Michael Davidson, the engineer who created the feature, admits this is for people who say, “I don’t have self-control”. Is quitting your e-Mail and IM, and shutting your cell phone ringer off for an hour or so at a time really that difficult?!

This leads me to think (perhaps being overly cynical?) that the aforementioned nonprofit study group may not lead to much. All things being equal, the simplest solution is best. This is a problem most easily solved by equipping and training our employees with basic productivity skills and making sure we as managers are leading by example.

Parents can go around their homes, inserting plastic safety caps into every power outlet in sight, or they can simply train their toddlers not to stick their fingers in the outlets. I’d rather train. Besides, it’s simply a matter of a few hours or days when the toddlers figure out how to remove the caps!

An unusually long and slightly more serious than usual Seth Godin post, mostly on what does not constitute a good use of e-mail communication. Worth reading, even if it does sting a bit when you notice a bad habit or two. E-mail checklist.

Possibly before some of us were using e-mail, Edward M. Hallowell, M.D. was writing about the importance of face-to-face communication and the drawbacks of e-mail and even telephone calls. He speaks of the “human moment”, ”an authentic psychological encounter that can happen only when two people share the same physical space.” The Human Moment has, according to Hallowell, two prerequisites, “people’s physical presence and their emotional and intellectual attention.”

His theory, explained in a 1999 Harvard Business Review article, The Human Moment at Work, (the first page of which is available for free here) was later expanded into a book, though one aimed at a much broader audience.

Boston.com features a great article with Hallowell’s ideas in a business setting in its jobs section, specifically as it applies for young workers entering the job market, and with some excellent insights. Worth reading.

It would be hard to argue against the theory that Human Moments, featuring face-to-face interaction, are essential to human well-being.

Being intrigued by the above articles, I just checked out Hallowell’s Human Moments: How to Find Meaning and Love in Your Everyday Life from the Library. Look for additional mentions of this book in future posts.

An article in RainToday, primarily written for consultants, has an interesting article entitled, The Death of the Business Phone Call, which explains the many the pitfalls of e-mail.

In a few sentences, “If your goal is to communicate clearly and efficiently with prospects and clients, relying too heavily on email can easily lead your digital conversation into the weeds. Even if someone emails you first, often the best way to respond is by picking up the phone.”

So, before you click on “Reply”, think, “what is the best way to respond to this?”. 

“Rarely does any dialogue end with the prospect’s question and my answer. The response to any query is usually followed by a clarifying question or two of my own, which can make email cumbersome. The most effective way to accomplish ongoing dialogue is via live conversation – the kind where lips move.”

Priority Magazine (a Pitney Bowes publication) published an excellent article on various forms of office communication, the advantages and disadvantages of each, and how to make the most of each - though they never posted it online. And as we know, if something is not online, it may as well not exist. I finally tracked it down online here at this other site. It covers e-mail, meetings, phone calls, and Instant Messaging. It is, quite simply, the BEST article I’ve seen on the topic and I strongly recommend printing it, reading it, and implementing its advice.

An article* in the Atlanta Journal Constitution profiles a business fed up with the disadvantages of e-mail.

The Chief Executive “informally polled his senior management team and found e-mail was overtaking their lives”…

He “couldn’t put a complete stop to e-mail. After all, it’s how business gets done these days. But he could rein it in. He declared Fridays ‘No e-mail’ day. With the exception of outside e-mails from customers, (his employees) cannot use e-mail on Friday.”

“Need an answer to a question or an OK on a project or advice? Get on the phone. Better yet, get out of your seat.”

E-Mail can, indeed, be a black hole sucking up all time let near it, yet it remains an important tool. Some of the problems are over-dependence on it and a lack of productivity skills to manage it. (To be covered soon in this blog.)

For now, encourage yourselves/staff/coworkers to pause; then think, “is there a better way to communicate this?” “Should I call, or use Voice Mail, or use iChat, or simply walk over to the person’s desk or office?” It may take something drastic like quitting your e-mail application for a day to force yourselves to do this. Give it a try. Tell us how it felt and what good became of your brave decision!

*The article, which once required site membership, has suffered an even worse fate and can now no longer be found.