Electronic mail: convenient, fast and efficient. Remember how you felt about the technology just five years ago?
The sad reality is that what was once seen as a step-change in communications networking has now become something of an information burden.
Email’s downfall has not just been as a result of the viral and malware infections it brings to the organisation, as serious a problem as that is.
The openness and ubiquity of the system has become a bigger issue, as spam and unsolicited messages clog up in-boxes. According to researcher IDC, email is one of the biggest contributors to poor productivity, gobbling up 14.5 hours of the average worker’s week.
But the ability to exchange written information easily and quickly using internet protocol (IP) networks remains a useful concept. So as public email systems grind ever so surely to a halt, many users have switched to instant messaging (IM).
Such a transformation in networking habits is not necessarily good news for the chief information officer (CIO). IM is by definition an open access method – the free public versions such as AOL, MSN, Yahoo, Google Talk and Skype are almost always picked by individuals – and there is usually no central control, meaning businesses have no idea how it is being used or what data is being transferred.
However, like it or not, IM is almost certainly already with you. According to analyst the Radicati Group, the number of worldwide IM accounts will increase from 944 million in 2006 to more than 1.4 billion by 2010.
Software giant Microsoft says 50 per cent of individuals use IM, mostly at work, with 58 per cent of those using the tool to communicate with co-workers in the same office. IDC, meanwhile, estimates that almost 12 billion instant messages are sent every day.
Apart from speed and convenience, IM users cite presence as a major benefit of message-based communications. Within an IM network, users can detect who is available right now, as well as who may be travelling, in a meeting or at lunch – and when they will be back online.
Advocates of IM say such presence means better use of time, as workers can keep better connected with colleagues without wasting valuable time leaving messages that will not be picked up until hours later.
Instant messaging, then, can help improve productivity for the organisation, and one such business already experiencing benefits is IBM’s Lotus division.
‘It can save so much time having a pre-meeting conversation online and exchanging data in meetings,’ says regional Lotus executive Ross Reith.
Carsten Brinkschulte, chief executive of mobile management software supplier Synchronica, says IM provides the benefits of the phone and email. ‘You get a quick response and it is not as intrusive as a call can sometimes be,’ he says.
End user organisations, meanwhile, are also starting to commit to IM. Luke Murray, chief executive of broadband environmental channel Globalwarming.tv, says instant messaging is essential.
‘The team in the development stage are all working remotely on the project from a number of countries, and IM allows us to keep in close communication at very low cost,’ he says.
Several versions are used in the organisation environment, says Murray, including MSN Messenger, Skype and Gmail chat. He says security is not a major concern, but he does still caution: ‘Avoid using IM for anything that needs to be secure.’
But Mike Ryan, IT manager with residential property marketing firm ESPC, which has been carrying out trials of IM as part of a package of services provided by ntl:Telewest Business, says he sees instant messaging as the key to a secure online environment. ‘IM is much better than clogging up the network with unnecessary emails,’ he says.
Even so, it might still be advisable to bring IM under supervision within your company – and as soon as possible.
In 2004 the American Management Association and the ePolicy Institute estimated that 50 per cent of workplace messaging users send and receive inappropriate content over IM, including confidential information, gossip and porn.
And a staggering 94 per cent of companies fail to retain and archive IM, which if translated to email or paper communication would almost certainly suggest catastrophic compliance issues.
Thus the onus is on providing IM that adheres to the usual organisational safety and security policies.
David Hahn, group product manager at security specialist MessageLabs, says that while the IT manager knows he needs to protect email and the corporate network, he or she remains unaware that IM could also be a big threat.
‘The answer has to be to replace public IM with private IM that can log and audit communications and be better protected through, for example, controlling namespaces so they are more suitable for business use or even terminating accounts if necessary,’ he says.
It is, therefore, time for technology leaders to start thinking about IM, and how to manage the system so it becomes a benefit, rather than a burden.
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