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Training and Face to Face Meetings Over the last six months the human relations department has been inundated with complaints form company employees regarding use of e-mail. These complaints range from “he’s yelling at me” and “I’m smarter than a fifth grader” to perceived sexual harassment. While working with our employees to resolve these complaints human relations has determined that no one was deliberately trying to offend.
It is understandable however, since we operate nationally, that cultures across our diverse regions perceive written correspondence differently. Additionally, these communication gaps were equally present at all levels of our company. Management, labor and contractors alike have all expressed difficulty when corresponding via e-mail. With that said; the following guidance in implemented immediately. 1. All employees have 30 days to complete eight hours of netiquette training. The goal here is to create a common foundation from which to improve our business communications.
Course requirements can be satisfied at your own leisure through on-line courses or you can attend night or weekend classes. Please check with HRS as they have already identified several institutions which offer classes tailored to our needs. If you are already participating in a course or come across a course that you feel could fulfill this requirement please stop by HRS as they have final say regarding course content. 2. E-mail has obviously proliferated organizational communications. At the same time it has almost eliminated worker interaction.
In n effort to get each of us out of our computer corners please follow and treat this guidance as a minimum acceptable standard. For anyone you correspond with on a daily basis you need to meet with that person at least once weekly. This requirement can be met informally or in conjunction with normal company business. If your correspondence is weekly then you should meet monthly. If your correspondence it monthly you should meet quarterly. Cost constraints must be considered when carrying out this policy. Trips are not authorized simply to comply with this policy.
However, managers are expected to consider this policy when making travel arrangements and developing traveling teams. Video teleconferencing is an acceptable alternative between regions. Summation: While our assigned reading covered e-mail correspondence from many aspects, the two areas that stood out strongest to me were misconceptions regarding “writer intent” and the disadvantage of not being able to read voice inflection and nonverbal communication when evaluating received e-mails. The authors of “Social Conflict:
Escalation, Stalemate, and Settlement (2002) conclude that “the escalation on disputes is more during electronic communication than during face to face communication. ” They cite these factors; experiences, visibility, audibility, contemporaries, utterances, simultaneity, and sequentially for not being present in electronic communications. Therefore they conclude hypothesize that they are primary contributors to conflict escalation when corresponding electronically. Similarly, Edward Hall (1959), points out how easily people’s feelings can be hurt hen we don’t understand social or cultural differences among our employees.
Hence the policy requiring netiquette training to establish a common frame of reference among our diverse work force. Although our assignment was not to persuade but to “create and announce” a policy change, I chose to acknowledge barriers to change thereby increasing the likelihood that these policy changes will be successful. Experience has taught me that change is seldom received well or implemented fully if the people being affected by the change don’t understand why the change was necessary.
By explaining how management arrived at the decision to implement the new policy they started the process of getting employee buy in. Additionally they’ve cut off the rumor mill before it even had a chance to develop and given their employees an avenue to direct their questions if the feel the need to challenge the policy.