Okay, yes. I went and bought the book from Amazon before I came here to post this. I bought it with my Amazon Prime account, so it'll get here in two days. Delivered to my front door.
I am Rob Lippincott. Well, at least as much like Rob Lippincott as a graduate student who has never had a real full time job, barring internships and summer jobs, can be. I'm an editor of two graduate publications. I have two side companies with a single partner. I intern for a group downtown. (I'll go into a little more detail about that later.) My only sister is getting married in a month and two days. My grandmother's health is in such a state that I have lots of family emergencies. Oh yeah, and I take more than the full load of graduate classes every semester. I'm a busy lady. And that's why I use Amazon Prime.
Who has the time to drive to a bookstore and purchase a book? I'd rather pay more to get it delivered to me. (In this case, you get free 2 day shipping on any purchase for $80/year.) I usually don't have time to look at anything more quickly than 2 business days later anyway. I've also tried an organic grocery delivery service here in town. They were pricey and I don't really care if food is organic or not. But I needed one less thing on my to do list. Ultimately, I stopped using them because their UI was too high maintenance after they went through a redesign. I started getting deliveries that I hadn't thought I'd ordered and I canceled the service. The reps when I sent them frantic emails were not very understanding or accommodating. I guess they had too many people competing for their attention too.
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I recently had a conversation with the big boss at my internship. My internship, I should mention, without using actual names that will pop up in searches, is for the state office of a national organization for older people.
Anyway, the state boss, while not the most technologically inclined person, also likes to play devil's advocate. I had long conversation, in which he lamented having to deal with 100+ emails a day that actually required some type of action or response. He also often had to respond to staff members' queries after hours. How, he asked, is this manageable? How is this reasonable?
Ever the technological optimist, I argued that an equilibrium point would be reached in the next 10 or 20 years. Otherwise, execs and managers would have to begin to be compensated accordingly; if they're spending more hours working, they should be paid for it.
My direct boss, I think, sees some generational differences. He recognizes that I don't feel obligated to respond to every single email if it doesn't warrant it or to people who I'm not responsible or beholden to.
In this way, I think many people in my generation-- or perhaps just uber geeky/dorky (I know there's a difference to some people, but I can't keep them straight) techie people like me-- are a little more savvy in managing info flow in this way. While many people at the organization that I'm interning for have hundreds or even thousands of emails (unread or not) in their inboxes, I use mine as a to do list. I intentionally keep my work outlook and my student/personal/student organizational/freelance gmail inboxes under 20 emails. I quickly address issues that need to be address and funnel emails into some sort of filing system away from the inbox.
Is this the wave of the future? How do y'all operating?
Should managers and execs be given trainings on managing information and incoming calls/emails/etc and work flow?
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1 comment:
gosh! So nice to see your post! I also got the book! So, can I vote now?
(1)Definitely
--trainings on managing information and incoming calls/emails/etc and work flow.--
(2) I keep my email zero unread. If a email message requires action and the action can be done within two minutes, I do it right away. If it needs more than two minutes, it depends on how much time I have at the moment. If not enough time, I star it or something....
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