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> BARRERO: You could write an email asking for those instructions and for that clarification, and it might delay your action a couple of minutes. That delay seems to be kind of what is dropping the productivity, kind of these frictions to communication.

What can we do to ease this kind of friction?

The example here is a little weird though -- it's the situation of a police dispatcher ... in which case, yeah e-mail as a low-latency communication volume in an emergency situation is less than ideal.

The only reason to use email is if you want a paper trail. Yes, you can't walk into some ones cube and interrupt their train of thought anymore, but is that productivity?
The evidence tends to line up with what management wants or needs to do at any given time.