They Called You a What?

Yesterday's post looked at some of the issues associated with the ways millennials communicate. Texting. Twitter. Facebook. You may want to read that post first.

As part of the source conversation for yesterday's post, someone mentioned that the nature of fast-paced texting could result in people making caustic or derogatory remarks to others, statements that they probably wouldn't make face to face or on the telephone. Interesting comment. But wasn't the same thing said about e-mail? Too impersonal. Encouraged sharp words. Caustic remarks. Things we wouldn't normally say in person or over the telephone.

I don't see this as a "millennial" issue. I see this as a policy issue regarding standards of proper conduct at work. If one employee were to make an offensive verbal remark to another employee and the employee complained about it, we would expect the supervisor to deal with the issue. Indeed, if the supervisor heard the offensive verbal remark we would expect the supervisor to deal with it even if the recipient didn't complain about it.

In a similar fashion, if one employee sends an offensive memo or e-mail to another employee (whether or not the recipient complains about it), if the supervisor is aware of it and it violates the company policies, standards or norms regarding workplace behavior we expect the supervisor to deal with it.

Is texting any different? "Oh yes," I was told, "the company has no record of the offensive comment because it's on the employee's personal communication device." Well that may be. But if the recipient is truly offended, then the recipient should be willing to show the message to her or his supervisor. And if the recipient wasn't offended enough to report the offensive text message, then I wonder if we really have an issue in the first place.

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