Business Insight Zone

The skepticism aimed at social-media use within companies would be more aptly directed toward e-mail use, a source of far more wasted time for workers, and one that has become as invisible as oxygen for most of us.

This BBC article — “Bosses ’should embrace Facebook’” – quotes a sensible study that argues for open-minded views toward the use of social media in the workplace:

“In today’s difficult business environment, the instinctive reaction can be to batten down the hatches and return to the traditional command-and-control techniques that enable managers to closely monitor and measure productivity.

“Allowing workers to have more freedom and flexibility might seem counter-intuitive, but it appears to create businesses more capable of maintaining stability.”

As I’ve argued before, command-and-control is dying a well-deserved death in the enlightened workplace, and certainly in the realm of social media.

But given my thoughts — and especially Dan Markovitz’s thoughts — on how e-mail so pervasively corrupts the typical office environment, it’s worthwhile to shine the same kind of spotlight on e-mail as well.

Consider this series of quotations from the BBC article, applying each to e-mail instead of social media:

Social networking can encourage employees to build relationships with colleagues across a firm, it added. . . . Firms are increasingly using networking software to share documents and collaborate in ideas, the research found.

When e-mail came into broad use in the early 1990s, smart companies quickly found out the same thing.

“Banning Facebook and the like goes against the grain of how people want to interact. Often people are friends with colleagues through these networks and it is how some develop their relationships.”

Using technology to build closer links with ex-employees and potential customers could also boost productivity, innovation and create a more democratic working environment, Mr Bradwell added.

It took a while for this insight to penetrate some corners of the working world, and indeed there are still older executives (Henry Paulson, Donald Trump, and Richard Branson come to mind) who never use e-mail. But for the most part, its merits for collaboration and productivity are clear.

But he argued the use of networking sites “must be tied to a business goal”.

And here we come to the crux: many businesses have rushed to block access to Facebook, LinkedIn, et al., without stopping to think that their people are already wasting much more time on e-mail.

The report’s authors said that clear guidelines needed to be set out about appropriate use of social networking.

And there should be no hesitation in telling employees who spent “unreasonable” amounts of time using technology for non-work related activity that their behaviour must change, they added.

Here’s the kicker: it’s obvious enough that someone is wasting the company’s time if they’re playing Scrabble with their friends via Facebook. But the lost productivity of fruitless e-mail — especially e-mail that’s ostensibly meant to propel work projects — goes totally unnoticed in many organizations.

Worse, in many organizations people face penalties if they use e-mail the smart way — that is, if they turn it off for long stretches of the day so that they can get their work done.

“But it is also good for companies to be aware of the tensions and look at deploying practical guidelines which will protect the positive impact of networks, not hamper it.”

Well said, and smart companies are already figuring out sensible guidelines for spending time on Facebook, LinkedIn, blogs, and so during work hours. But they need to remember that the most pervasive social medium in the workplace is e-mail.

Get e-mail right, and you can probably afford to let your folks play a game of Scrabble when they want.

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Related posts:

• Social media breaches barriers.
• Information overload: the best of the best take pains to avoid it.
• 7 Good Reads to Boost Your Productivity

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(Hat tip: Jeremiah Owyang.)