Email overload: Exploring the moderating role of the perception of email as a business critical tool
The management of email remains a major challenge for organisations. In this article, we explore the extent of the perceptions of email as a business critical tool within an organisation and how the level of such perceptions may moderate the level of email overload experienced by individuals within the organisation. Data from a sample of 1100 employees of a multinational technology firm are analysed using multivariate techniques. The results suggest that without a clearly stated code of email practice within an organisation, there are likely to be large variations in what is perceived as business-critical email and, as a result, a substantial amount of email generated within the organisation may not be business-critical, potentially increasing the level of email-overload experienced by individuals within the organisation.
email overload management information