Written Communications: "If You Can Read This, You're In Trouble"
By: Rod Lacey
Sunstone HR (Human Resource Consulting)
There are many measurements of time, one of the shortest being the nano-second. There is a new time metric that has been defined as the “ohno-second”, or the time between when you click “Send” and you realize that you’ve just made a huge mistake. Maybe you’ve ‘replied to all’ by accident, or sent confidential information to the wrong “John.”
Carved In Stone
One of my favorite activities on a vacation is to look for ancient petroglyphs. These carvings in rocks have lasted hundreds or even thousands of years. What was written long ago still exists today. We may not understand the meaning or original intent, but those images and once-important stories are on track to last forever.
With the current, heavy
reliance on written communications in business, and the ease that has been
created by text, email, social media and instant messaging, the face-to-face
conversations are slowly losing their valuable place in our communication
style. "Why should I walk over to see you when I can IM and get a quick reply?" "Why should I call you when an email allows me to click “send” and quickly move
on to my next task?"
Here’s some statistics
related to how our electronic communications are growing:
- In 2013 over 100 billion business emails were sent and received per day.*
Even more alarming are the
poor practices that occur in business:
- 50% of employees have sent or received emails that include jokes, stories or pictures of a “questionable” nature.**
- 6% of employees have emailed confidential company information that they should not have.
- Although 92% of employees said they had never sent an email that put their company at risk, however 68% in fact had.**
- More than 25% of companies in a recent survey have fired an employee for email misuse; most of the terminations were for inappropriate or offensive language and violation of company rules.**
Elliot Spitzer, former NY
Governor and lawyer said “Never talk when you can nod and never nod
when you can wink and never write an email because it’s death. You’re giving prosecutors
all the evidence we need.”
Have you ever worked for a
company when the discovery-hold notice from Legal is circulated? If your
communications related to that topic were written, they may as well have been
carved on stone – they’re on track to last forever.
Back to some
statistics:
- 24% of employers have had email subpoenaed by courts and regulators and another 15% have battled workplace lawsuits triggered by employee email.***
The same rule applies to social
media posts. Unless you have completely misrepresented your identity, there is
no imaginary shield that protects your online activity from discovery. There is
also a fuzzy line that defines when you are acting independently, or acting as
a company representative. Be careful what you carve in stone in any forum.
As a seasoned human resources
professional I have had meetings with employees at all levels of the
organization about their online activities. Most of these individuals were just
coached but some were fired.
A good communications policy
can protect the company to some degree, but if you consider that the average employee sends or receives over 100 emails
per day*, even the best of policies still leaves the company exposed.
Understanding and respecting
that written communications are a necessary and productive work forum, here are
some helpful tips to consider before any written communication is sent (aka:
carved in stone):
Consider the Weight
As a general practice, and
assuming you aren’t corresponding under attorney-client privileges, the weightier
the topic, the more verbal communication should occur. When the email chatter
gets more serious, a simple “I’ll be right over” or “Call me” would be more
appropriate than continuing to circulate sensitive information.
Be wary of the unintended
consequences of e-discovery. Ask if you would want your email read out-loud to
a jury in front of your CEO and General Counsel.
Consider All Potential
Audiences
Never send anything that
could be offensive to anyone. I was once involved in the firing of an employee
at another company. Back-in-the-day when everyone mass-forwarded the 'joke of
the day', a racially insensitive joke began to circulate in my company, which was
brought to my attention by an employee, in a protected class, who was offended.
As I worked to clean-up the mess in my own company I was able to identify the
chain of emails and exactly who had first sent it to an employee at my company.
I contacted the HR department at that company (as the individual sending the email used his/her work email) and
informed them of the email and its impact on one of my employees. I left the
discipline up to that HR team, but learned days later that the employee had
been fired.
Never E-Fight
You know what I’m talking
about. Whenever I’ve encountered the ‘rage email’ in my inbox, I never reply.
Instead, I immediately walk down to that person’s office, close the door and
say “Sounds like we need to talk.” Without exception, the issue has never been
as big as was expressed in the email.
If you’re typing is in ALL
CAPS, or your tone feels that way, don’t send it!
Avoid E-Threats
Never threaten harm or undue
consequences to another employee, especially in writing. Performance
expectations are a good practice to communicate in writing, but let’s limit
consequences to subjects related to performance management.
Pause Before You Send
There are many measurements
of time, one of the shortest being the nano-second. There is a new time metric
that has been defined as the “ohno-second”,
or the time between when you click “Send” and you realize that you’ve just made a
huge mistake. Maybe you’ve ‘replied to all’ by accident, or sent confidential
information to the wrong “John.”
Even in our busy lives, it
is well worth the time to pause, take a deep breath, proofread one more time
and triple-check our work before “send” is clicked.
Avoid Names Where
Possible
Wouldn’t it be embarrassing if
you named an employee with performance challenges in an email and in a
whirlwind of forwards through management, that employee eventually was copied
on your note? Or, what if you expressed exasperation with an employee, by name
in an email to the manager, for her use of FMLA, and your email was subpoenaed
for her later EEOC claim?
If the receiver knows who
you are referencing, you could refer to the ‘current situation’ or something
generic (although please not derogatory) rather than naming the employee. If
the material is super sensitive, it should be reserved for a face-to-face
conversation anyway.
Be Careful with Sarcasm
Meaning is difficult to
convey in writing, so sarcasm may or may not be fully understood. Even if that’s
your go-to communication style, business emails should be written
professionally and your sarcasm should be saved for a forum where you get the
pleasure of the real-life 'laugh-out-loud.'
Never Vent in Writing
If you need to vent, walk to
your friend’s workstation and ask if they have a few minutes to talk. Negatively
communicating via any medium with names, roles, titles and functions attached
could have negative consequences.
In high school I was on the
wrestling team. On the walls of that sweaty wrestling room were dozens of
motivational posters. The one that stands out to me the most is the one that I
hoped never to read. The only poster on the ceiling of that room read “If You Can Read This, You’re in Trouble.”
A wrestler reading that would have to be on his back, looking up at the ceiling,
struggling for his existence, and very much in trouble.
Considering that written
business communications today are essentially carved in stone, I keep a mental
image of that wrestling poster in my mind before I click Send or Submit.
I do my very best to never to
send anything that would cause me to fear “If you read
this, I’m in trouble.”
References:
*Email Statistics Report, 2013-2017 The Radicati Group, Inc.
**Lisa Guerin, “Smart Policies for Workplace Technologies”
***American Management Association, “2007 Electronic
Monitoring & Surveillance Survey.”
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