Good morning all. I have been listening for a while. I will try to add o
the dialog for a bit.
Business Overwhelms is I think a subset of our modern life overwhelms.
Here in the US at least, we are inclined to set many goals and standards
for ourselves. We must achieve at home, at work, in our communities, with
our extended families, and with our friends. And accomplish this all at
once. Our own drive to excel spills over into areas that often overwhelm
us in tasks that are not really worth while. This list has been dialoging
on the e-mail administration issue for a while. Perhaps the discussion
has been dealing with symptoms rather than causes.
Have you asked yourself why you receive so much e-mail that is not of
interest? The follow-on question is how much e-mail do I originate that
is not of interest to those I address?
Several months ago I suggested that leaders establish some criteria for
becoming involved in decisions. Perhaps this same concept can filter out
messages at their origins. In addition these filters can be empowering to
your team. Just as examples here are some possible rules.
1. Any decision that is internal to your team need not be referred to me.
2. Any decision that effects two teams and the team leaders agree need
not be referred to me.
3. Any decision that will effect one of our customers, and the customer
may not be happy about, refer your decision to me for information
purposes.
4. Any decision that will effect one of our customers and they will be
unhappy about let's talk to see if there is another way.
5. Any decision that you and someone else cannot agree to without my
input, get the three of us together and let us talk it out.
Now I am sure that there are many more rules that could be set. The above
are focused on decisions. How about focusing on technical details. If
you are worried about how much concrete to use don't bother me. If you
are concerned with what level of fire protection to design into the
building then involve me.
The cause of too much e-mail is people send too much e-mail, it is not a
technology issue. There have to be leadership strategies that get an
organization to the right amount of e-mail. I guess this is the seed your
oysters model.
Aloha
Bill
--"William J. Hobler, Jr" <bhobler@worldnet.att.net>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>