Electronic mail and organizational communication: Does saying hi really matter?

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Sarbaugh-Thompson, M; Feldman, MS
• 署名单位: Wayne State University; University of Michigan System; University of Michigan
• 刊物名称: ORGANIZATION SCIENCE
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1047-7039
• DOI: 10.1287/orsc.9.6.685
• 发表日期: 1998
• 页码: 685-698
• 关键词: organizational communication; ELECTRONIC MAIL; availability; greetings; co-presence

摘要

When people use electronic mail, they can communicate even when they are not physically or temporally proximate. Thus,it is not surprising that most studies report that the use of electronic mail increases organizational communication. In the study presented here, overall organizational communication declined as use of electronic mail increased. As we probed the nature of this decline, we discovered that much of the lost communication was greetings. This raises questions about the role that greetings, and other forms of casual conversation, play in an organization. To organize our insights about this topic we formulate a two-by-two communication matrix based on presence versus absence and availability versus unavailability. Prior research focuses on the ways being present and available and being absent but available through electronic mail affect the performance of specific communication tasks. Using our typology, we direct attention to the role of casual conversation in presence availability and to the parts that presence unavailability and absence unavailability can play in organizational communication.