Study: More Employees Checking Work E-mail in Off Hours

It is no secret that information technologies, like email and mobile phones, have become increasingly more prolific and necessary in our world today.  This fact not only speaks for the personal aspects of our lives, but the professional ones as well.  IT is a larger part of commerce today than it ever has been, with one of the staple technologies under this umbrella being email.  According to this article, people believe email to be a double-edged sword.  It allows them to be more productive and carry out the tasks of their jobs more effectively, but at the same time the boundary between work and free time becomes blurred.  49% of the respondents in the survey for this article said that email makes it much harder to have that necessary disconnect from work.  This fact rings even more true as people begin to use mobile technologies to check their email and engage in professional communication away from their computers.  

This situation offers quite a catch-22.  The whirlwind of innovation that yields so many amazing technologies really does strengthen our ability to communicate with one another as people.  However, the same technology that allows us to stay in touch with our friends and family is the technology that allows us to do our jobs and communicate with people at work.  As more cutting-edge technologies start to be developed I think that the professional demands of people will increase exponentially.  The fact is that working people, who also happen to have active personal lives, become increasingly more accountable for things in the workplace as these technologies are released.  As an owner of an iPhone, I can see how it could be just a little too easy to stay connected to work and play at the same time.  I personally am addicted to recieving email on my phone because it helps me stay stay in touch with people I care about.  However, because of this technology I am constantly aware of demands being put on me.  It is my belief that this issue will only grow more hotly debated as the boundary between work and play becomes even more nebulous and fuzzy because of IT.  

CNN Tech: Employees Checking E-mail in Off Hours