HR.com pushed out a very interesting article about IM and how it can reshape communications in your organization.
"The promise of IM is compelling: real-time, text-based communication that cuts through the usual social niceties of face-to-face conversation, phone calls, and e-mail messages. IM allows users to ask a quick question, get a quick answer, then get back to work. It connects geographically-disparate teams and allows multiple users to simultaneously participate. It also supports multitasking, since pretty much anyone can dash off a quick message while speaking on the phone."
This is not a plug, but if you're interested, sign-up at HR.com and read the article in the "Areas of interest/HRIS/Other" category. One downside they don't note: If you install a consumer based IM inside the network firewall (yahoo, msn, or aol) you are giving people free access into the network. Basically consider IM an open window or tunnel to your PC. This means that someone could potentially use that tunnel to your PC and hop into the network space. There are other IM agents available from providers like Lotus that create corporate IM systems.
