- Image by geirarne via Flickr
I received a funny message from my wife today. She told me that the company she works for were removing Instant Messaging (IM) access for all employees as of January 1 2009, due to employee abuse. What made it funny was that she used MSN Messenger to tell me – you have to admire the irony.
Yet it then got me thinking. The company she works for is one of Canada’s largest business communication solution providers. They have approximately 6,000 employees and revenue of over $2 billion.
They service some of the most forward-thinking companies in North America today by providing some truly leading edge communication tools. So why so poor at internal communication?
I can see why they’d remove an external instant messaging service. Productivity could be impacted as well as there being security issues. But to not have any kind of internal messaging system apart from email? This doesn’t seem like effective business practice, particularly for one whose core business is in the business communications field.
It’s not as if there aren’t a host of options available. Yammer is an excellent Twitter-like option that’s ideal for business use. There is also Jabber, which I used during my time at FedEx and again this was a great way of instant communication. These are just two – there are many more.
Email is a great tool, but in today’s business place it’s fast being superseded by instant messaging services. Faster response time, multiple users, less compatibility issues with networks – these are just some of the key benefits of using IM.
For anyone not using some kind of IM service for their business, perhaps it may be time to look at the benefits. And for my wife’s company?
Perhaps you should communicate with each other as well as you do with your customers.
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Greetings from Hungary,
I only want to add my story. Some months ago our IT guys installed a newer version of Lotus. It has got an IM function but they decided to disable it until they find a way to enable it to everybody at once. That’s the latest information about it.
Before that I heard that there are some technical issues that’s why they didn’t do it earlier.
And before that:
A new internal communication manager joined the European headquarters (in the Netherlands) of the company in September. She asked around and she were unable to find a proper answer why the IT staff didn’t do their work (i.e. enable the IM).
Well, the case is simple as I see (and my opinion is based on some conversations with our IT manager and my supervisor). They do not trust the employees and that’s why they do not want to install it.
I believe they do not get this “social media in the corporate world”. Our management (Japan) is a command and control one but the European HQ staff prefer a more open way. It will be interesting to see what happen next. BTW, the company is owned by the Japanese (100%).
And a suggestion related your wife’s company: set up plenty of water coolers. Back to the past…
Csaba Szücs´s last blog post..Communicate key information to the employees
Interesting points, Csaba. It raises the question many companies should be asking themselves – if we don’t trust our employees, why did we hire them in the first place?
Offer the tools to do the job effectively and if that trust is broken, then perhaps speak to the individual as opposed to punishing the group. Otherwise, aren’t you just punishing yourself?
Thanks for stopping by and hope to see you around here more.
Danny, believe it or not but the above mentioned IC manager posed the same question to my supervisor. You can imagine, she cannot say a word in response.
BTW, as I see this is a generation gap issue with the social media here in Hungary. FYI: We (my family) got our land line phone ~15 years ago. And we were amongst the first ones – except from the rich, who had land line phones in that time. So my superiors do not use the net and its opportunities so often…
..and I definitely will drop in the future
Csaba Szücs´s last blog post..Communicate key information to the employees
An agency I consulted to previously used IM (ICQ) for internal communications that didn’t need a full fledged email. It was fabulous!
We don’t use an IM where I’m at now and I sorely miss it. It truly does have a place in internal business communications.
We do have an internal communicator. I didn't use it to message you because you're not internal.
However, it is junk. It often signs you in and out without any aid. You see that you are online, but to everyone else you're offline. This is one of it's tricks. Your messages bounce back for no reason at all.
Many of us find it quicker to communicate through MSN even though we're not supposed to.
Alas, msn has been removed and we have to resort to the slow way of communication… email
Sorry, my error. Although I guess if it's as bad as you say it is, then it's pointless having it in the first place and just the same as not having one?
Hopefully your company can come into the 21st century sooner rather than later…
funny and here our company is striving to move forward in technology yet we can't get our internal communicator to work