The Power Issue, 12/27/99

Backspinner Mark Gibbs and 'Net Buzzer Paul McNamara go head-to-head over an increasingly contentious business issue. Do you enact stringent e-mail and Web usage policies, or do you let employees use these resources any old way they want?

Mark Gibbs

They say the next big thing is here
That the revolution's near
But to me it seems quite clear
That it's all just a little bit of history repeating.
- "History Repeating" by the Propellerheads

When it comes to business, keep these axioms in mind:

1) Anything that is very difficult and not a life-or-death issue won't get done.

2) Things that don't save or make significant money won't get done.

3) People and organizations take the path of least resistance.

The proposition that corporations will clamp down hard on e-mail and Web browsing seems, at face value, reasonable. After all, money is involved. But it violates all of the axioms above. As they say, it's a load of horse puckey.

Think of it as an equation: If the value of e-mail and Web access control isn't significantly greater than the cost of the control mechanisms, control doesn't make sense.

"Ah," you may exclaim, "but there is real value! What about all that wasted staff time?" Sorry, I don't buy that argument because the costs are illusory. Think of how this cost is calculated: "The average employee is paid $Y per hour and browses the Web for Z minutes per day. Given the Q million workers in this industry, $X is lost every year."

In reality, you can't possibly glue all of those blocks into chunks of hours unless you are going to micromanage employee schedules. And smart corporations recognize that you don't get results from micromanaging people. You set goals, manage by objectives and get out of the way.

The other factor to consider is the high price tag of controlling e-mail and Web use over the long term. The decision to exert control won't last long because the return on the investment won't make sense, and when there's no payback, the path of least resistance - not doing it - is the one to follow.

Access is cheap, and control is expensive. As employees get used to the medium and companies to managing by objectives, we'll find that if employees don't break the law and abuse company resources, management won't care.

The Internet is ushering in new business styles and ways of operating. In the face of revolutionary forces, many managers are over-reacting and thinking of implementing Draconian Internet usage policies. Is this unusual? Not at all: A similar scenario played out when telephones and photocopiers entered the business world, and look how relaxed most organizations are about these devices today. This too shall pass, and we'll realize that it was just bit of history repeating.

Paul McNamara

Take this prediction to the bank: Bosses all over America will soon be yanking the full-access Internet privileges that have made checking stock quotes and sending e-mail as much a part of our workdays as the coffee break. They will because "efficiency" has become the watchword of American business. They will because lawyers have become the ultimate power brokers of the boardroom, and sexual harassment lawsuits their scariest bogeyman. They will because the necessary filtering technologies exist to make Internet control more efficient. They will because they can. Which isn't to say that they should.

My colleague to the left argues that most bosses don't, won't and shouldn't care what workers are doing with Web browsers and e-mail as long as they get the job done. Moreover, he says, any effective policing of workplace Internet use is likely to flunk cost/benefit analysis. In a nutshell: Reason will prevail.

The heart hopes Mr. Gibbs is correct, but the head fears otherwise. According to a study cited in a recent Newsweek story on "cyberslacking," 90% of workers admit to surfing recreational sites and 84% confess that not all of their e-mail is business-related. The rest of those surveyed are either lying, delusional or working for companies that have already unleashed the fun police. Business managers are not going to ignore those kinds of numbers, at least not for long.

Here's another telling nugget: 27% of businesses surveyed by the American Management Association already report that they are monitoring worker e-mail. This surveillance may be concerned with protecting intellectual property through filtering for telltale phrases such as "product launch." But why not simply add "Love, Dad" or "Meet me at the Motel 6" to that list of red flags?

Such will not be the case everywhere. More enlightened employers will still treat their workers as adults.

However, at a newspaper outside Boston, a reporter was called on the carpet for having sent a résumé through the office e-mail system. How was she busted? Filtering. Why was a newspaper filtering e-mail? Not to prevent big scoops from being shipped to competitors, but because the paper is part of a chain owned by an enormous financial services company. One rule fits all. Enjoy your surfing breaks while you still can.

What do you think? Weigh in in the Power Shifts forum

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