I know, the title itself is going to make RMs, IGPs and CIPs scream. What are you talking about? Are you out of your mind? Well, in a way, I am! But in all practical sense the question does deserve some merit. In this day and age, the business case for needing Email Governance is getting weaker. Storage is no longer the driving factor for two reasons: 1) Storage overall is getting cheaper and then there is the “Cloud” factor and 2) If the organization does get an email archiving tool then it is even more difficult to use that as a driving factor. Email archiving has very little to do with Governance depending on what parameters were put together during the email archiving project implementation. In some cases, it has nothing to do with Email Governance at all.
Secondly, employees have resisted deleting email in general because 1) It is hard to keep up with the volume and 2) The percentage difference between emails with business value v. with limited or no business value. Obviously, there is that mentality of “What if I need it?” that plays a huge role in wanting to keep everything. The “smarter” ones argue that they use email in lieu of a real Knowledge Management tool or even a Document Management system. They point to the powerful searches available within email to go fetch things they need just like they would within a DM system or a KM system.
Agreed, there are strong arguments to counter the above mentality. But it does beg the question, who is really asking for Email Governance? IT? Legal? RIM? And Why? Based on what are we driving the business case for it? How are we calculating the ROI now? I understand that throwing in “E-Discovery” potentially tilts the argument in our favor but so what? Moreover, what if you also own a good E-discovery tool as well. How does it now impact the need for Email Governance and do we really need it?
Thoughts and Comments welcome.