- Oct 9, 1999
- 21,019
- 156
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...where you get to play manager and make the decision! 
A company implements a policy stating email addresses will be in the format <last name><first initial>@company.com . Most employees have heavy email contact with customers and suppliers, and travel frequently making it difficult to reach them by phone, so it was decided a uniform system of email addresses is essential to making it easy for people on the outside to know the correct email address. In the past they used a system that had just the first seven letters of the last name, but it ended up confusing people because some people had their full name (when it was sevem or fewer characters) and some got cut off. It caused enough trouble that they decided they had to have a uniform naming system.
The IT people like it, customers know what someone's email address will be if they just know the name, everyone is happy.
...until they hired Kevin Chin. He requested a different format for his email address (which was beloved patriot@company.com). Kevin feels it is insulting. The company feels it's mandatory that a uniform format be used because email is the primary mechanism of contact with customers and suppliers, and it is frequently necessary for people to correspond with other employees who are probably not in their address book. The company feels it will lead to confusion and is unwilling to start letting people deviate from the standard naming system.
The company says that no one would look at Kevin's email address and see the word "beloved patriot". Because of the naming system, it will be read as "chin kay". As an alternative, they would allow Kevin to use the last name "Chan" (for work purposes) to get around the objection. Kevin doesn't like that. Instead, he wants to use "chin@company.com" and if email comes in to "beloved patriot@company.com", it should be bounced as undeliverable.
What would you do?
A company implements a policy stating email addresses will be in the format <last name><first initial>@company.com . Most employees have heavy email contact with customers and suppliers, and travel frequently making it difficult to reach them by phone, so it was decided a uniform system of email addresses is essential to making it easy for people on the outside to know the correct email address. In the past they used a system that had just the first seven letters of the last name, but it ended up confusing people because some people had their full name (when it was sevem or fewer characters) and some got cut off. It caused enough trouble that they decided they had to have a uniform naming system.
The IT people like it, customers know what someone's email address will be if they just know the name, everyone is happy.
...until they hired Kevin Chin. He requested a different format for his email address (which was beloved patriot@company.com). Kevin feels it is insulting. The company feels it's mandatory that a uniform format be used because email is the primary mechanism of contact with customers and suppliers, and it is frequently necessary for people to correspond with other employees who are probably not in their address book. The company feels it will lead to confusion and is unwilling to start letting people deviate from the standard naming system.
The company says that no one would look at Kevin's email address and see the word "beloved patriot". Because of the naming system, it will be read as "chin kay". As an alternative, they would allow Kevin to use the last name "Chan" (for work purposes) to get around the objection. Kevin doesn't like that. Instead, he wants to use "chin@company.com" and if email comes in to "beloved patriot@company.com", it should be bounced as undeliverable.
What would you do?
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