Space and time

You can do a lot by email – but you can’t manage.

Hmm. Well, you can kinda-sorta manage, and that’s the deceit. 

It certainly allows communication. Anytime, anyplace. You can stick things on their list, ask questions, engage in (slightly protracted) debates, nudge things forward, give feedback, contribute, monitor, ask questions. We accept the obvious downsides – like missing the humour, the pace, the body language, the nuances you’d infer from intonation. When it works well though, it’s almost like being in the room.

The deceit is in the ”almost“.

From behind the veil, through that ”almost”, without the real-time face-to-face body-language rich, interactive, dynamic, two-way dialog, without the nuance, it’s all a little bit (lot) two-dimensional.

Management happens in meetings.

Technology can help when it’s easy or simple, but constructive relationships, complex feedback and difficult conversations demand shared space and time.

Skippy strategy: Management is a whites of the eyes business.

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