The “End” of Email: Reflections from a Digital Era Thinker

A recent statement made by Thierry Breton, CEO of Atos, about the "elimination" of email at the company churned up quite a bit of controversy in cyberspace. Many of the pieces sharing the news included misinformation, and much of the commentary reflected misunderstanding. This post clarifies what Atos is actually doing, offers insights on why it’s the right move, reflects on some of the reasons for resistance, and highlights the importance of strong leadership in enabling organizations to move ahead in the Digital Era.

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Last week there were a number of articles and blog posts about “the end of email” after news of a statement by the CEO of Atos (a large French technology company) went viral. Almost all of these items generated a number of impassioned responses rejecting the use of “social” tools and defending the use of email for a variety of purposes.

Unfortunately, many of the pieces written about the announcement included sensationalistic headlines and/or misinformation, and many people took the news quite literally – which seemed to cause much of the harsh, knee-jerk reactions. So let’s start by clarifying what CEO Thierry Breton was really referring to:

• His decision was focused on internal email only.
• Atos will not be using a public platform like Facebook for internal communication. Rather, they will use similar tools that are designed for private social networking.
• Atos will not replace email with internal social networking and instant messaging exclusively. The idea is to leverage a variety of 2.0 tools to improve employees’ ability to communicate and collaborate.

Expanding on the third point, many of the comments I read seemed to reflect a poor understanding of the kinds of communication and collaboration tools that are now available for organizations of all types (not just large, high-tech firms). Social business platforms can certainly include social networking and real-time chat features, but those are just two of the many capabilities most of them offer (for more on social business technologies and their applications, check out slides 7-19 in this presentation). With respect to the replacement of email in particular, the key features to focus on include asynchronous chat streams (including status updates and microblogging), discussion forums, wikis, file sharing and editing, and the ability to create centralized group and project worksites.

It’s probably unfortunate that terms like social business, social enterprise, and social intranet have emerged to describe the application of 2.0 technologies inside organizations. Many people interpret words like “social” and “chat” to indicate frivolity, shallowness, time wasting and a lack of professionalism. Arguing about semantics can be such a distraction, but relabeling and reframing the tools may help skeptics get over their resistance and focus on their “work value.” We could, for example, refer to:

• Private Digital Networks r/t Internal Social Networks
• Quick Collaboration or Quick Exchange r/t Chat
• Announcements and Queries r/t Status Updates

 

Email’s Inefficiencies

In many respects, email can be considered the granddaddy of today’s social business tools – it certainly meets the basic definition of social media I shared in Part 1 of the Social Media Primer (updated here). But, relatively speaking, it’s fairly unsophisticated and clunky. And, more importantly, it’s often misused and abused.

Given its inefficiencies, the goal behind shifting away from email is a valid one. For example:

• Lots of exchanges (e.g., when/where do you want to meet?) don't need to be preserved, and each message in the back and forth gets saved, causing lots of unnecessary duplication. Having a centralized chat feature - which can be asynchronous - can eliminate that.
• For cases where the conversation should be preserved, a centralized discussion thread is probably more appropriate than dozens of email exchanges with duplicate – and often disconnected – content. Not only does a single discussion thread save resources and minimize confusion, it's also easily accessible to/by others for whom the discussion may be relevant.
• Exchanging documents via email is a colossal waste, and it can create a lot of confusion. Rather than passing a document around, it's better to put the document in a central, shared location and let people come to it. Doing so is not only more efficient, it also better enables people to know what the latest version is and can prevent two people from attempting to revise the document at the same time. History on the document can also be tracked.

Today's social business platforms offer both individuals and organizations more efficient and effective ways to get their work done. For me the key advantage of these platforms is that rather than having the work distributed to the workers, the work is centralized and the workers come to it. That reduces unnecessary duplication, confusion about what version of something is the most current or what the latest word/decision was on a particular issue/conversation, and many other benefits.

Email won’t go away, but that doesn’t mean we should continue to use it the way we do today. Instead, we should recognize where it has the most value and where another tool can be more effective. We should all be open to using new technologies to help us work smarter. And yet…

 

Email Attachments
(and I’m not Talking about Documents)

One of the most powerful realities of the world we live in today is that the capabilities of the communication and collaboration technologies available to us far outstrip our human ability to harness them. It's not that we can't use these tools – they are widely available, inexpensive, and relatively easy to implement and use – we simply don't. This list of reasons is long, and include

• Our tendencies to resist change, stay inside our comfort zones and take the path of least resistance
• Fear (of the unknown, of failure...)
• Our unwillingness to risk learning something new
• Our short-term focus and tendency to be in a hurry ("get it done now" rather than "do it right")

Another key element that is too often overlooked is the fact that we're still using Industrial Era models and modes of working, even though we're well into the Digital Era. For example, rather than collectively creating and refining a single repository of relevant knowledge/information using wiki technology (think barn raising), we prefer a more linear, assembly-line approach of passing around a document that we "manufacture."

There's also an ironic contradiction in how we function in our personal and professional lives. On a personal level, many of us are very comfortable working in a divergent, non-linear fashion – which I would argue is natural for our brains – but when it comes to work we kick into structured, Tayloresque factory mode. Why? Because this is what we’ve been taught throughout both our academic and work lives. The habits are deeply ingrained and tough to change.

So what’s a Digital Era worker to do?

 

It All Boils Down to Leadership

I commend Thierry Breton and other business leaders who recognize the value in leveraging new digital technologies to enable their employees to work more efficiently and effectively. As demonstrated by the reaction to his recent comments, however, this type of Digital Era leadership is still extremely rare. Most leaders do not understand the potential power and uses of new technologies – or how important it is to educate themselves about both their applications and implications (both external and internal). Those who do recognize they need to:

• Make the increased use of digital technologies a strategic and operational priority
• Support the creation/adoption of new tools and technologies
• Allocate necessary resources (both money and time) to enable employees to use these tools effectively

I’m looking forward to seeing what happens in 2012…

-  Courtney Shelton Hunt, PhD

Comments

[Courtney Shelton Hunt, PhD]

For more thoughtful discussion of this issue, I recommend the following "Room for Debate" piece in the NY Times:

http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/12/05/should-workplaces-ban-e-mail-37

Be sure to watch the Luiz Suarez documentary video, which is short but powerful.

[Nico Durand]

Great article that summarizes well the problems of email. I beg to slightly disagree on the bottom line. Surely, leadership is important, but the most important is the technology. It needs to be powerful enough to satisfy all the abovementioned criteria AND be simple enough to not generate user resistance. I have yet to see a tool that can effectively replace email. I am not saying it's not possible, just that I have not seen one yet (or heard of one). Google pulled Wave (which probably was the closest real-world public example. A Facebook-like platform is not efficient enough. Where are the tools?

Once the technology challenge is solved, leadership will be the single most important key success factor.

[Chris Parente]

Courtney, aren't we talking about unified communications (UC) here? Doesn't seem to me a hard concept to grasp, though many don't exactly define the term the same way.

UC and social media platforms can be merged, they are not mutually exclusive as a Forrester report recently suggested. For example, my client Polycom recently teamed with Jive Software to offer companies the best of both worlds for better internal collaboration.

[Nilay Yajnik]

Nice post Courtney.Here are some of my views:
It may be relevant in a corporate context to ban social networks (public ones) in the office due to possible productivity loss.But I don't think they should be banned in an Academic environment.A lot of good knowledge exchange happens through these public networks which are very helpful in teaching and research.
Regards
Nilay (Mumbai , India)

[Courtney Shelton Hunt, PhD]

Thanks for your comments, Nico, Chris, and Nilay.

@Nico - I have been working with a client over the past few months to select a social platform for enhancing internal communication and collaboration. There are dozens of options, and though none of them is perfect, almost all of them offer significant improvements over email. These platforms are constantly improving, making significant changes rapidly, so I think we're very close to having a solid set of technological standards. Leaders' awareness and understanding of today's digital capabilities, however, are still quite low.

@Chris - Yes, Unified Communications probably does cover this issue - though as you said, there isn't consensus on the definition of that yet. Plus, it's also a term that's not well known outside of IT and even less understood. I prefer to emphasize communication *and* collaboration, as well as the professional networking aspects of new technologies, and UC doesn't quite get at all of that.

@Nilay - You bring up a good point that distinguishes the internal and external applications of new technologies. Inside an organization, it's better to employ private digital networks and their tools. For external engagement, public platforms can be quite effective. But it's also possible to create private (or semi-private) digital networks for external engagement also, and I think we'll see more of that as time goes on as well.

Thanks again!

[Courtney Shelton Hunt, PhD]

This post has also generated some great discussion in the following LinkedIn groups:

Harvard Business Review
http://www.linkedin.com/groups/End-Email-Reflections-from-Digital-3044917.S.84940224?view=&gid=3044917&type=member&item=84940224

UNC Alumni
http://www.linkedin.com/groupItem?view=&gid=70968&type=member&item=84940214

Non Profit Professionals
http://www.linkedin.com/groupItem?view=&gid=81092&type=member&item=84940215

Web 2.0 for Higher Education
http://www.linkedin.com/groupItem?view=&gid=1221447&type=member&item=84940212

Thanks everyone!

[Niraj]

@Courtney, I understand collaborative workspaces like wikis, document sharing and discussion boards where people come to for work can help a lot, but people would still need a 'notification system'. Maybe the newsfeed or activity feed is the notification system of tomorrow, replacing the email.

But isn't it true that anything that replaces the notification system abilities of email would be prone to the same problems, namely email clutter/overload and frequent attention switches as people feel compelled to look at what has arrived.

The solutions to this are systemic. There are reasons why people send so many emails and notifications - most of CC and mailing list abuse today is because people just want to cover their backs. I think such systemic problems need to be fixed to fix the communication problems in companies.

I blogged about it at length on our blog here: http://blog.grexit.com/why-atos-zero-email-policy-does-not-make-sens

Look forward to knowing what you think.

[Courtney Shelton Hunt, PhD]

Thanks for your comment, Niraj, and the link to your related blog post.

I am not someone who thinks email should - or will - go away. Quite the contrary: I think it plays a valuable role in digital communications. The key is to determine the most efficient and effective channels and tools to use to pursue various objectives and to use them appropriately. Easier said than done, I know...

As for your CYA argument, I think that alternative forms of communication can provide better tracking, history and archiving than email, so I don't think that's a valid reason for anyone to justify the continued use of email rather than another channel/tool - at least not technologically. The systemic cultural issues that lead people to think they must engage in CYA behaviors, however, are a whole other ball of wax...