Survey highlights e-mail productivity and storage concerns

By Kate Clifton

Organisations looking to improve their productivity during 2006 should look no further than their e-mail inboxes, according to new research. In a US study conducted by Harris Interactive for Fortiva, more than half (59 per cent) of survey respondents said that they spend too much time searching for lost e-mail, while one-third added that they have wasted even more time re-writing misplaced communications.

In addition, 28 per cent acknowledged that the volume of e-mail they receive causes them to fall behind in their work.

While reliance on e-mail as a critical business tool has exploded, many organisations are still relying on basic e-mail management products to deal with the data influx and simply cannot cope. This, says Fortiva’s CEO Paul Chen, has a knock-on effect on business. “E-mail has arguably been the greatest productivity tool for organisations over the past decade, but it can bring with it a number of challenges,” he says. “Without the proper search and storage tools, e-mail can actually reduce productivity levels. Organisations are wasting huge amounts of their employees’ time just sorting through, filing and saving e-mail for future use.”

And it’s not just issues around the location of business e-mail that can impact these productivity levels – 61 per cent of survey respondents said that they regularly used their work account for personal reasons.

Interstingly, this activity was more common with those on higher salaries. 66 per cent of respondednts earning more than $50,000 said that they relied heavily on work e-mail for personal use; compared to 55 per cent with incomes between $35,000-$50,000 and 49 per cent with incomes below $35,000.

And while personal usage of corporate e-mail is widely associated with lowering productivity, it can also put pressure on corporate e-mail storage resources.

A substantial number of respondents (27 per cent) said that they have already reached, or exceeded, the amount of storage space allocated to e-mail at their organisation.

And it is here where the problem lies: storage – especially with increasing regulatory legislation concerning the retention of business records and communications. This, says Fortiva, is why e-mail archiving solutions are growing in popularity.

The online study canvassed the opinions of 1,042 adults that regularly use work e-mail.