Four Overlooked Email Risks: II

In Part I of this series, we explored how email exchanges are susceptible to differences in the elapsed time between someone authoring a message and its recipients reading it. We called that elapsed time end-to-end latency. One consequence of what we called "end-to-end latency" is a lengthening of the time window during which incorrect message content might be mistakenly regarded as correct. In this Part II, we examine two more consequences of end-to-end latency.

Scrambled time order

Because of variations in latency, the time order (either receipt or origination) of contributions can differ from what would have been their time order if the conversation had been conducted in a synchronous medium environment, such as telephone, teleconference, or face-to-face. For example, in a synchronous medium, time order of contributions is identical for all participants. Not so in email, because of variations in end-to-end latency.

During the During the end-to-end latency
period of a given message,
the conversation can evolve in
ways that render the message
irrelevant, incorrect, or
worse — incorrect but
regarded as correctend-to-end latency period of a given message, the conversation can evolve in ways that render the message irrelevant, incorrect, or worse — incorrect but regarded as correct. Any recipients who read their email in forward time order of receipt (or origination) might be wasting their time, especially if they try to respond to a message that has been overtaken by events. This problem is amplified if they actually send responses based on an outdated understanding of the situation.

To manage this risk, some recipients might read their email in reverse time order of receipt (or origination). But they might have difficulty understanding later messages due to lack of context knowledge and backward references.

Polychronicity

In most synchronous meetings there's some control of the current topic. With more than three to five participants, the chair or facilitator calls on individuals, who are then expected to offer relevant contributions. In smaller meetings, cultural norms usually provide a relevance constraint that similarly ensures that contributions relate to the current topic. Such a conversation structure is called monochronic — it addresses one topic at a time.

By contrast, few email exchanges are facilitated. They are therefore more likely to be polychronic — addressing two or more topics concurrently. Participants are free to contribute whatever they want whenever they want. And because of variations in end-to-end latency, contributions to a particular topic can continue to appear even after most participants regard the topic as closed. The resulting structure might contain multiple "threads," developing in one intertwined and sometimes-confusing jumble. In some cases, a single message might contain contributions to multiple threads.

Some groups try to limit the confusion by means of email subject lines. By carefully pairing their contributions with appropriate subject lines, they can make conversation threads more obvious. But there is no central control. Each contributor is responsible for choosing the right subject line, and deviations are common. And topics can be reopened at any time. Often, confusion reigns.

The results we achieve with email are different from — and often inferior to — the results we would have achieved with actual conversation, either by telephone or face-to-face. Yet we use email because we choose not to spend resources on travel or state-of-the-art video conferencing. The choice might or might not be justified economically, but most organizations don't know, because they don't track the cost of bad decisions. First in this series   Top    Next Issue

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Reader Comments

By Baylis, HigherEdByBaylis LLC

For all 40 years of my active academic career as a college administrator, I believed that face-to-face communication was preferable to written communications. However, one afternoon, that all changed. As the result of the implosion of a benign meningioma due to a burst an aneurysm produced two life-changing events. It was as if a switch was thrown in my head and my thinking was no longer verbally based. I found myself thinking visually. I read or heard words my mind immediately went to a visual picture. I had to process that picture visually. To communicate back, I had to translate the pictures back into words. Responses will no longer instantaneous. I was fighting a fiendish deficiency, which I call "oral aphasia." I can no longer count on calling up words on demand. In order to have a meaningful oral conversation, I must rehearse what I intend to say before I utter the phrases.

For the past decade, email has become my preferred means of communication because I have time to process my thoughts into appropriate language.

Although I stated earlier that as an administrator I preferred face-to-face communication, early in my career I came to the realization that there were times when the written word was absolutely necessary. In legal terms, a verbal contract is not binding.

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Related articles

More articles on Effective Communication at Work:

Let Me Finish, Please

We use meetings to exchange information and to explore complex issues. In open discussion, we tend to interrupt each other. Interruptions can be disruptive, distracting, funny, essential, and frustratingly common. What can we do to limit interruptions without depriving ourselves of their benefits?

Preventing the Hurt of Hurtful Dismissiveness

When we use the hurtfully dismissive remarks of others to make ourselves feel bad, there are techniques for recovering relatively quickly. But we can also learn to respond to these remarks altogether differently. When we do that, recovery is unnecessary.

Conversation Despots

Some people insist that conversations reach their personally favored conclusions, no matter what others want. Here are some of their tactics.

They Just Don't Understand

When we cannot resolve an issue in open debate, we sometimes try to explain the obstinacy of others. The explanations we favor can tell us more about ourselves than they do about others.

Four Overlooked Email Risks: I

Working together to resolve issues or make decisions in email is fraught with risk. Most discussions of these risks emphasize using etiquette to manage emotional content. But email has other limitations, less-often discussed, that make managing email exchanges very difficult.

See also Effective Communication at Work and Writing and Managing Email for more related articles.

Forthcoming issues of Point Lookout

Coming May 12: Pre-Decision Discussions: Emotions

Some meeting agendas include exploring issues related to upcoming decisions. Although we believe that these discussions are purely rational and lead to rational decisions, some contributions evoke emotional responses. Here are five examples. Available here and by RSS on May 12.

And on May 19: Pre-Decision Discussions: Reasoning

When we meet to resolve issues related to upcoming decisions, we sometimes rely on reasoning to help find solutions. Contributions to these discussions generally use mixtures of deductive, inductive, and abductive reasoning. How do they differ, and what are their strengths and risks? Available here and by RSS on May 19.

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