If you’re at a company where these sorts of communications aren’t considered strategically, you might try talking to your managers/execs about it. I bet that more than 50% of the time, there’s a good reason and good motivation underneath those overly-corporate, soul-destroying emails. Convincing them that being more open about the reasons and more considerate in the presentation will have a positive impact probably won’t take much work.
This was a great post and of great value to me as I get started building a company where I want to create a better than status quo culture (the Valve post is also great, so far it's been a good morning).
However, I had to laugh at the comment above a bit. If you are in a company that has this sort of problem, it probably isn't the e-mails that are destroying company culture but the culture that's creating the soul destroying "policy" e-mails and micro-management. Trying to change that culture by gently suggesting ways to "frame things" differently is going to be about as effective trying to dig up. But hey, good luck anyways.
This was a great post and of great value to me as I get started building a company where I want to create a better than status quo culture (the Valve post is also great, so far it's been a good morning).
However, I had to laugh at the comment above a bit. If you are in a company that has this sort of problem, it probably isn't the e-mails that are destroying company culture but the culture that's creating the soul destroying "policy" e-mails and micro-management. Trying to change that culture by gently suggesting ways to "frame things" differently is going to be about as effective trying to dig up. But hey, good luck anyways.