The digital world has taken over all our lives. Sometimes that’s for the better, but there are also unintended negative consequences.
Apps, social media, emails and the like have made communications much simpler and quicker – but, on the flipside, have made human contact at work less likely. Dramatic cuts to the public sector workforce in local government, central government, the health service, the police and many others, have, in many cases, doubled individual workloads.
Many of these bodies have turned to the digital world to deal with the public, and even one another – emailing people in the same office rather than talking to them.
Mobile phones now have such a wide variety of apps, many of which just distract us away from interacting with our colleagues – and that could, in the long run, be used as manipulative management tools. Look around the canteen at lunchtime – if people even have time to eat away from their desks – and you’ll see people on their mobiles tweeting, Facebooking and texting, sitting opposite another who’s doing the same. Is this really good for building a work community? Is this a culture that enhances our wellbeing and colleagueship?
The recent law passed in France, making it unlawful in both public and private sectors for managers to send emails outside of office hours, blazes the trail here. It can’t realistically be enforced, but it sends a clear message to employers about how they should use the digital world. Already, businesses such as VW block emails at night. And Liverpool council’s initiative to prevent email communication between staff – albeit only on Wednesdays – was implemented back in 2002.
But the public sector needs more innovative solutions to delivering better public services, which means more face-to-face interaction. There is an old Chinese proverb about society more generally but applies to the workplace as well: “If you are planning for one year, plant rice. If you are planning for 10 years, plant trees. If you are planning for a hundred years, plant people.”
Prof Sir Cary Cooper, CBE, is the 50th anniversary professor of organisational psychology and health at the Alliance Manchester Business School and president of the CIPD
