Friday ban on e-mails: would it work for you?

[jbinder]

'A growing number of employers, including U.S. Cellular, Deloitte & Touche and Intel, are imposing or trying out “no e-mail” Fridays or weekends' (source: The San Diego Union-Tribune, 12 Oct 2007).

Do you believe a ban on e-mails on selective days is required to "teach" people on how to collaborate using more traditional media (like face-to-face, video-conferencing and telephones)? What are the advantages and problems of implement this type of practice on your company?

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[Apollo]

I have worked in Accenture (China), and what I have experienced in Accenture was just the same as the problem you have just talked about.

Always, people use email to contact with their colleagues working in the same office. Even though it save the time and cost, there is a,apparently, negative effect on the communication level, sometime even the company culture.

However, I still don't reckon that "a ban on e-mails on selective day" is a good idea.

It is true that email is not the only tool for office worker to contact each other, but its usage as the most effective file-carrier in office is absolutely unquestionable. Especially when the files needed to be transferred are too big for the other tool, FAX for example.

In my opinion, the most effective way to “"teach" people on how to collaborate using more traditional media is building an atmosphere where people among it all would like to communicate to each other directly without email.

In order to make it clear, I will suggest two methods. I really hope it will be useful for you.

Firstly, incent the staff to “stand up and walk”
The corporation should build the mechanism to incent the clerk to stand up, take a move and talk to the one they should contact. For example, the company could set an award named “the best walker” which will be selected at every weekend by all the staff. Every person will choose one most vigorous clerk in their floor respectively, and the one who scores most will be rewarded by the HR and even could post her/his photo on the company’s wall. Likewise, if needed, the company could make another award named ”The Potato ” for those is the least vigorous in company.

Secondly, we should tell all the staff the disadvantage of sitting too long and let them know how terrible it will be if they don’t pay attention to the way they live in the office, sitting in their own seat all day and sending email to their colleague next to him without even saying a word and move any pace.