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> I don't see how that's a problem for the organization. IMO, one of the lessons that came out of Chernobyl is that it absolutely is a problem for the organiza

> I don't see how that's a problem for the organization. IMO, one of the lessons that came out of Chernobyl is that it absolutely is a problem for the organization. Exposing people to too many "alarms" that are constantly going off will cause people to start ignoring them. Part of good design is figuring out which things are truly important, and how to communicate that to the people who are supposed to be paying attention.

MichaelZuo 4y ago
The analogy seems not to apply? The emails mentioned by the parent don't sound like alarms. Because an alarm is usually for 'drop everything and focus on this' situations. The equivalent in email terms would be a receiving an email with a subject in ALL CAPS bolded and underlined. Or in general intra-company communication terms, a phone call from your boss without any pleasantries and a serious voice.
- Volundr 4y ago
  Alarm or not doesn't really matter. If a person is receiving a signal that does not affect them most of the time they WILL start to ignore that signal. Many will attempt to combat this with policies and consequences, "Make sure your reading these e-mails, or else!" but it's a fruitless endeavor. Humans will human. Better to recognize that and build your systems around it.
  - MichaelZuo 4y ago
    So what? If someone makes the wrong decisions because they start ignoring signals then don't promote them or give them important coordinating responsibilities. Those who are capable of filtering out a larger fraction of noise do exist. Of course there will always be folks whose preference is to read near 0% of their emails, but that doesn't imply organizations must be designed around them.
    - post-it 4y ago
      Finding someone to blame doesn't matter if the company goes bust.
      - MichaelZuo 4y ago
        It's not about playing the blame-game, it's simply to make sure the personnel in responsible positions are those who can handle it, in a verifiable on-the-record way.
    - Volundr 4y ago
      > If someone makes the wrong decisions because they start ignoring signals then don't promote them or give them important coordinating responsibilities. Those who are capable of filtering out a larger fraction of noise do exist. This is simply wishful thinking. Outliers certainly exist, but the idea that there are sufficient number of them that you can just ignore human nature is a path to disaster. You'd have to somehow accurately measure not just who is opening these noisey e-mails, but what they are retaining from them, and measure it over a large period of time, knowing that the vast majority or going to fail. It's far cheaper and more reliable to fix your noisey system than to try to outwit human nature.
      - MichaelZuo 4y ago
        > It's far cheaper and more reliable to fix your noisey system than to try to outwit human nature. Can you describe this 'cheaper and more reliable fix'?
        Volundr 4y ago
        Yes. Make sure you are sending people notifications that are relevant to them, instead of sending all your employees the firehose and relying on them to pay close attention on the off chance something they need to know actually slips in.
        MichaelZuo 4y ago
- alexvoda 4y ago
  You appear to not have experienced intra-corporate spam. When __everything__ is highly important and #urgent#, nothing is important and urgent.
  - MichaelZuo 4y ago
    'Everything' may be labelled or described as 'highly important and #urgent#' but they may not correspond to reality. In a sufficiently large and complex organization there will always be some percentage, neither 0% nor 100%, of actually 'highly important and #urgent#' hidden among the pretenders. The point of any such tracking system is to discover, via positive or negative selection, what is actual instead of what various flawed humans pretend.

MichaelZuo 4y ago

The analogy seems not to apply? The emails mentioned by the parent don't sound like alarms. Because an alarm is usually for 'drop everything and focus on this' situations. The equivalent in email terms would be a receiving an email with a subject in ALL CAPS bolded and underlined. Or in general intra-company communication terms, a phone call from your boss without any pleasantries and a serious voice.

Volundr 4y ago
Alarm or not doesn't really matter. If a person is receiving a signal that does not affect them most of the time they WILL start to ignore that signal. Many will attempt to combat this with policies and consequences, "Make sure your reading these e-mails, or else!" but it's a fruitless endeavor. Humans will human. Better to recognize that and build your systems around it.
- MichaelZuo 4y ago
  So what? If someone makes the wrong decisions because they start ignoring signals then don't promote them or give them important coordinating responsibilities. Those who are capable of filtering out a larger fraction of noise do exist. Of course there will always be folks whose preference is to read near 0% of their emails, but that doesn't imply organizations must be designed around them.
  - post-it 4y ago
    Finding someone to blame doesn't matter if the company goes bust.
    - MichaelZuo 4y ago
      It's not about playing the blame-game, it's simply to make sure the personnel in responsible positions are those who can handle it, in a verifiable on-the-record way.
  - Volundr 4y ago
    > If someone makes the wrong decisions because they start ignoring signals then don't promote them or give them important coordinating responsibilities. Those who are capable of filtering out a larger fraction of noise do exist. This is simply wishful thinking. Outliers certainly exist, but the idea that there are sufficient number of them that you can just ignore human nature is a path to disaster. You'd have to somehow accurately measure not just who is opening these noisey e-mails, but what they are retaining from them, and measure it over a large period of time, knowing that the vast majority or going to fail. It's far cheaper and more reliable to fix your noisey system than to try to outwit human nature.
    - MichaelZuo 4y ago
      > It's far cheaper and more reliable to fix your noisey system than to try to outwit human nature. Can you describe this 'cheaper and more reliable fix'?
      - Volundr 4y ago
        Yes. Make sure you are sending people notifications that are relevant to them, instead of sending all your employees the firehose and relying on them to pay close attention on the off chance something they need to know actually slips in.
        MichaelZuo 4y ago
alexvoda 4y ago
You appear to not have experienced intra-corporate spam. When __everything__ is highly important and #urgent#, nothing is important and urgent.
- MichaelZuo 4y ago
  'Everything' may be labelled or described as 'highly important and #urgent#' but they may not correspond to reality. In a sufficiently large and complex organization there will always be some percentage, neither 0% nor 100%, of actually 'highly important and #urgent#' hidden among the pretenders. The point of any such tracking system is to discover, via positive or negative selection, what is actual instead of what various flawed humans pretend.