E-mail Beware

“Nearly one-in-five (19 percent) outbound e-mails poses a legal, financial or regulatory risk to its company, according to the survey of 308 U.S. organizations with more than 1,000 employees.”

With figures like these, it’s no wonder the topic has been at the forefront of executives’ minds. As our world revolutionizes to one which is embedded in technology, our company policies and guidelines must follow. New forms of electronic information submittal are giving way to a need for a new strain of workplace policing--online.

In many instances, e-mail is taken too lightly and information can be easily misinterpreted. Because it’s an effortless and immediate form of communication, we forget that once we hit send, it becomes permanent. Unlike a conversation, there is a virtual “paper trail” left behind that can continue to spread with the press of a button. This includes confidential company plans, contacts and financial information.

Because of the risk associated with mishandled e-mails, companies must be stringent in enforcing their policies. “More than a quarter (27.6 percent) of companies said they’ve fired an employee in the last 12 months for violating e-mail policies and 45.5 percent have disciplined an employee for violating e-mail policy in the same time period.” Employees need to understand that e-mail composed at the office or with company-owned equipment is property of the employer, not the writer.

Learn more about technical policing.

Posted by Shelly Paul, Career Management Coordinator, The H.S. Group

No More Mr. Nice Guy...er, Girl

“Women working full time earn about 77 percent of the salaries of men working full time,” and researchers have finally begun to crack the code to explain why.

Recent experiments show that, given the opportunity, men tended to be four times more likely to ask for more money than women in the same circumstances. And the ability to ask (or lack thereof) is part of the problem. Women often shy away from demanding higher pay as they feel it will lead them to be perceived by their peers and superiors as less nice. According to Professor Linda Babcock of Carnegie Mellon University, “Men are simply more aggressive than women, perhaps because of a combination of genetics and upbringing.”

In addition, men who were surveyed displayed a preference to working with women who did not negotiate their salary. Whether or not these men felt threatened by more “aggressive” women remains to be seen.

Those individuals who fought for higher pay benefited more than you might imagine too. “Although differences in starting salaries are usually modest, small differences can have big effects down the road. If a 22-year-old man and a 22-year-old woman are offered $25,000 for their first job, for example, and one of them negotiates the amount up to $30,000, then over the next 28 years, the negotiator would make $361,171 more, assuming they both got 3 percent raises each year.”

However, it may not be as easy as encouraging women to be more self-assured or cutthroat; the passive response is merely a product of their environment. Read More about the social stigmas here.

Posted by Shelly Paul, Career Management Coordinator, The H.S. Group