How do you react when you receive a work email after 9pm and before the new work day begins? Is it a warm fuzzy feeling or does it cause you stress? If you answered the latter, you are not alone. Studies have shown that late night or super early morning e-mails can actually hurt your team's morale and cause stress.
Years ago when companies began their recessionary journey into cutting the fat off their organizations an interesting dynamic also came with it. Many managers found themselves wearing many hats, and achieving results with a lesser level of resources. The dynamic that arose from this experience was a yearning for more balance -a true balance between work and play.
Fast forward to current time, and that late e-mail takes on a tone and even a culture for its organization. An employee can develop stress from the communication if the company has not shared their e-mail communication rules and expectations. Knowing this information will help to manage stress and also keep everyone on the same page as far as expectations for e-mail attentiveness.
Important highlights in this communication could include acceptable response times to emails given the time of day the message is sent, and also the priority an e-mail communication should take. If a manager e-mails after 9pm there should be a clear expectation that the sender just wants it to be an e-mail that gets a response in the early morning. If it's an emergency the communication should really be a phone call or a face to face meeting.
E-mails can deliver many messages, and you want them to be productive messages that help and nurture the team.
Thank you for reading my blog.
No comments:
Post a Comment