Please do forgive me sending you an eMail about eMails – I feel sure that you will love the irony!!
I came across a really good article in my favourite read – Harvard Business Review (HBR) – page 26 for those that still enjoy the feel of paper…. Of course the more sensible will immediately click on to the CIPD website and go to the online journals where you have access to HBR as part of your membership – what a good deal!
The article by Chris Brown and Andrew Killick describes how the European management team of International Power dramatically reduced the amount of time spent on sending and receiving eMails. The really interesting finding was that the drop in subordinates’ eMails was much higher than the drop in the managers’ eMails so the return was much better.
This is such good news to ease eMail fatigue and improve efficiency, so that morale and productivity gains can also be felt. Their simple low cost approach was to:
- teach everyone to be more deliberate in their eMail use
- ask them to set a target for reducing the number of messages they send, and include it in their performance goals
- give them weekly feedback
So will I be peeking into my eMails after 6th September? Or will I Role Model and try to practice what I hope we try to preach? The trouble is my Driven to Deliver characteristics somehow get in the way!!
Do remember that there is the opportunity to win a bottle of Ridgeview bubbly for the best three entries for our summer competition. The deadline date for entries is 1st October 2013. Definitely something for you to play with whilst on the beach or as you return to work!