I often wonder how I got through life before email became so widespread, and I certainly wonder how large national and international businesses survived the pre-email communication era.  But, with every advance comes a few pitfalls, and email is no different.  Although most larger company’s and internet-based email systems have figured out ways to deal with the spam and the unwanted viruses sent through email, there are still some problems lurking out there in cyberspace.  BusinessWire recently included a short press release on a white paper from StratAssemble, titled, “Can your business survive email?” that certainly points out many of these problems. 

The focus of this white paper is certainly not anti-technology.  It is actually designed to demonstrate a need for newer collaboration project software in businesses.  Although this is a sales device, it is one that does a good job of providing the necessary background information, defining specific problems and the ways that the new software would solve for those problems.  Now, if your business is not suffering any of the ten email pitfalls on a regular basis, it certainly would not be worth your money and time to invest in this new software.  But, the white paper offers some great insight into the ways email can become a problem in the future and you can brainstorm methods of dealing with these problems short of purchasing new software.  For example, if you are finding that “scattered data” is a project problem in your organization, you might consider setting up a gmail account for each project and using their “documents and spreadsheets” area for storage of data.  This provides a centralized “cyber” location for data without an expense to your business.

Email is definitely a big plus in my life, but after reading the white paper, I have a few areas which I think I will be working on in email communication with my students.  I also think this is something that should be discussed with students in high school and college, where much of communication is switching to email/online.  Starting out with an awareness of some of the email pitfalls makes it more likely that individuals will be able to overcome those problems without expensive alternative software.  Perhaps this is also something to consider including in corporate training, if it is not already included at your company.