Is checking e-mail during business meetings career suicide?
This post was written by Marsha Egan on August 19, 2008
Posted Under: Email Bankruptcy, Email Etiquette, Email Overload, Email Productivity Tips and Solutions, Email Usage Research and Facts, Productivity
Posted Under: Email Bankruptcy, Email Etiquette, Email Overload, Email Productivity Tips and Solutions, Email Usage Research and Facts, Productivity
AOL’s recent study has affirmed to me a lot of what I’ve suspected. 38% of the people in the survey have checked their e-mail in a business meeting. This does not mean when they are waiting for the meeting to begin, it means during the meeting.
What could these people be thinking?
I saw another study recently where top executives were surveyed regarding their opinions of people who use their blackberries or PDAs during a business meeting. A full third of them considered it to be unacceptable. So if one out of three top executives considers checking the Blackberry as inappropriate, and 38% of the survey admitted to doing it, it looks like some careers could be in jeopardy!
For the full survey visit http://www.crazyforemail.com/.
Reader Comments
Our surveys show an even greater level of annoyance regarding this practice.
We posed the issue: The use of PDAs (i.e. Blackberry) in meetings is often distracting.
54% agreed that it is distracting which is a proxy for annoying.
This practice also degrades the quality of meetings which represent about 30% of the business week. Poor meetings then create more emails to communicate what should have been handled at the meeting!