My father was a lawyer and had a simple word of advice for his children and friends, "Never write down *ANYTHING* on paper that you don't want shouted from the rooftops." He was speaking in a pre-e-mail age, but I am sure he would have applied the same advice to the electronic word. If you doubt the wisdom of these words, consider the case of Michael Brown, former FEMA Chief. For those who may not remember, Brown was in charge of the response to Hurricane Katrina, and was forced to resign in light of the debacle of Federal Aid in the first week or two after the disaster.
Now, I am hardly trying to defend Mr. Brown or his career at FEMA. But he is now being savaged for writing e-mails with phrases such as "Can I quit now? Can I come home?". And for "taking the time" to deal with family matters such as finding a dog-sitter during the crisis. I feel very sorry for this turn of affairs, because all of us have turned to e-mail as an informal means of communication and often allow personal thoughts or matters to be done there. Brown's problem is that by Federal Law all e-mails for Federal employees are matters of public record. He should have been posting these thoughts instead on AOL, I guess.
In the meantime, we should probably all stop putting personal thoughts in corporate e-mail, and start treating every missive as though it were a press release. It is the only wise course of action.
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