Imagine a friend describing a great party she is planning--wonderful food, music, people, dancing--all on a beautiful exotic beach. Too bad it is in New Zealand and you are in New York. Your loss.
Or your home office emails you about a fabulous company event. All the important people will be there. It will be a perfect opportunity to get known around the company. Unfortunately, the event is in Toronto, you are in Tokyo, and travel budgets have been axed. That is a shame.
How would you feel about those two non-invitations? Disappointed? Irritated? Jealous? Taken for granted? Do not worry--they are imaginary.
But the many corporate emails sent each day to "all employees" are real. Such messages tell brokers in London about a picnic in Los Angeles, service specialists in Mumbai about dinner in Montreal, and disaster clean-up experts in Houston about a fashion show in Dallas.
Why invite people who cannot attend? You know the answer: it is the beauty and the curse of being able to communicate withall employees in seconds.
If you are guilty of sending all-employee messages about free donuts in your local conference room, stop! You are making people feel disappointed, irritated, jealous, taken for granted, and just plain frustrated. After all, they cannot delete the message without seeing what it is about--and knowing that, once again, they are left out.
This issue is on my mind today because of lunch with a friend who is fighting the good fight against all-employee messages at his new company. He says the people there have never thought about these things.
Let us encourage more thinking about all-employee messages. Do you receive emails that invite you to impossible events? Please share your story.
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