Instant messaging is used a lot in global organizations, though like so many other tools it can be misused, abused or used ineffectively. Like email, it can benefit from being supported by an etiquette guide (here's an example http://pcworld.about.com/news/May302002id99405.htm) that advises on good practice for use of the instant messaging (IM) tool in the particular organisation.
Where IM comes into its own (and has a big advantage over email) is in situations where one is remote from an individual or group of individuals who have specific knowledge that we need to tap into instantly - if we call them on the 'phone and they are in a meeting or busy, then the cal will likely go to voicemail. Similarly, email may not receive their attention for sveral hours or even a day or longer. On the other hand (and providing they are on-line) then our IM query will pop up on their screen and the chances are (if we have established a good working relationship) and don't constantly bombard the individuals with futile messages) that they will briefly interrupt what they are doing to give us a response. This can save huge amounts of time and/or re-work. One way to look at it is as a replacement for the kind of office banter that goes on when face to face in the office. "Who can remind me how to do x in Excel?" "What is our curreny policy in the company on y?" For virtual collaborators it can act like the virtual water cooler, enabling folk to participate in a bit of social banter when thy sign on in the morning - catching up with their buddies, or maybe just notifying their colleagues that they are on-line. Most instant messaging systems willl enable you to view your 'buddy list' and determine whether they are on-line, and also to put a 'do not disturb' or 'not available' sign against your name.
For more details see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant_messaging
o.k, I don't USE IM, as a regular tool. I will consider it, but so far, I have thought of it as "just another interruption..." That said, i can see the point of using it, so will give it a try. i looked over the wikipedia article and read the business section. Both that entry and this wikinomics entry both point to having 'rules' for company operations - so my question is this: where are these rules? Is there a copy that someone can point to? Thanks.
contributed by Michael Laine on Aug 13 8:56am
Chatting is not as familiar as emial among executives. In my experience it's because chatting let different persons to send message al the same time. When there are only two persons involved this would be managed by scrolling up and down to read the messages and try to build the meaning of the conversation. Of course this gets more difficult if the chat window is too small and the speed of writing messages is faster than the speed to read them. I have seen too many executives giving up with chat because they felt it was impossible to manage. If you get more and more persons to a chat room, the problem rise exponentially and you get a really mess. Nevertheless, this is the same problem that we can find in a meeting room if peolple involved start to talk without any order, all at the same time and each one about the issues that each one consider of interest. In the physical world, at all offices in the world and since many many years ago, the executives have fixed this potencial problem at their meetings using a protocol, it means, an agreement between the participants: an schedule, an agenda and a moderator among others facilitators. If we use this approach within our chats we can transform chatting into a very powerful collaboration tool. In my experiencie, in virtual meetings is necesarily a more strict protocol than in the real world. It's necessary a short agenda, a pre designated turn keeper, a moderator and list of commads to represent the usual action in a meeting, like hand raising, go ahead, etc.
contributed by Max Ugaz on Jul 14 5:09pm
I added this one http://pcworld.about.com/news/May302002id99405.htm
contributed by Peter Haine on Sep 10 1:39am
Page Last Updated: Sep 10 1:39am by Peter Haine