On Wall Street, a High-Ranking Few Still Avoid Email (reuters.com)

The world may be increasingly becoming digital, but a small group of the Wall Street elite refuses to say anything substantive in an email, text, or chat, and some will not communicate digitally at all. From a Reuters report: This group, which includes top bankers like JPMorgan Chase & Co Chief Executive Officer Jamie Dimon and powerful investors like Carl Icahn and Berkshire Hathaway Inc's Warren Buffett, were eschewing electronic communications long before the probe of U.S. presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's emails and the recent hacks of her campaign manager's account made headlines. Some on Wall Street are nostalgic for a time when in-person conversations or phone calls were the norm, but others believe the words they type and send can come back to haunt them. Prosecutors have built insider trading, mortgage fraud and rate-rigging cases on embarrassing emails over the past several years, and they are often the most memorable part. Recent email woes among Washington power players have provided yet another reason for bankers to try to protect private correspondence from prying eyes. Dimon uses email but is known to keep his replies short and factual, favoring "yes," "no" and "thank you."

Comments

Smart move

[Geoffrey.landis]

Judging by recent stories, sounds like they're pretty wise.

Re:Smart move

[93 Escort Wagon]

I'm betting this policy of theirs predates email... it was probably already in place back when written/dictated letters were the norm.

On a related note, I work with someone who follows a similar practice. I've figured out she will call me if she doesn't want something on record. She's not a higher up... more of a not-completely-trustworthy coworker who relies on unsubstantiated appeals to authority as a stick. If she can't reach me by phone, she'll wait until she can catch me in person. With her, I've learned to follow up on any verbal exchanges with an email asking for clarification/elucidation - basically forcing the conversation into a more-auditable mode.

Re:Smart move

[Archangel Michael]

I have a phrase, it is quite useful: "Can I get that in Email?"

If the answer is "no", then I assume I am free to ignore that request. Since they have no record of the request, then they have ability to fire me for not following said request. It is really easy to play that game, you just have to play along. The issue is, you have to play it 100% of the time.

And if they ever try to "Get" you, you play dumb, "I don't recall".

The other thing I find useful is sending an email with a "brief summary" of whatever meeting it was. If they don't respond, then that is tacit acknowledgement the summary is accurate, and it becomes official record. Any non-written "clarification" would be followed up with same.

The problem is, far too many people find sleazy as an acceptable practice in organizations, and actively participate in the sleaze. Don't participate and you have nothing to worry about.

That's just common sense for crime organizations.

[ZecretZquirrel]

The feds are watching.

On the record

[A10Mechanic]

Where I work, sometimes you want it on-the-record. I want proof I said something, or did something, far more often than I'd ever want to be able to deny such actions later on.

Re:On the record

[ShakaUVM]

>Where I work, sometimes you want it on-the-record. I want proof I said something, or did something, far more often than I'd ever want to be able to deny such actions later on.

I also try to make sure any important communications get logged in email. If I have a phone call, I will email the client and summarize what we talked about. Not only does this minimize miscommunications (which can be very costly), but it has led to me winning a lawsuit when the client claimed I had never communicated with them and wanted to cancel an upcoming event I was going to speak at, despite having a contract and all that. So I printed out my copious email communications with them planning the event, put it and the contract in front of the "judge", and he took a look over the evidence and awarded me the full amount on my contract plus legal fees.

Without the emails it would have been very hard to prove just through phone records that the event had been planned and booked six months in advance of the event date.

Re:On the record

[jenningsthecat]

Where I work, sometimes you want it on-the-record. I want proof I said something, or did something, far more often than I'd ever want to be able to deny such actions later on.

That's because you're a peon. Perhaps well-paid and well-respected, but a peon nonetheless, compared with those who effectively run the world. The farther up people are on the ladder of power, the harder it tends to be to tell the difference between them, and the criminals recognized as such by the justice system. Most of them cover their tracks, live substantially covert lives, and have adopted 'plausible deniability' as a second-nature practice. It might simply be prudence, or it might be the vestige of a guilty conscience in an otherwise sociopathic makeup. Whatever it is, it seems to go with the territory.

Makes sense

[ErichTheRed]

I know I, as a lowly mid-level person, am very careful and exact about electronic communication. Whatever side of the Clinton email thing you're on, how would you feel about having the last 10 years of your private communication dumped out in an investigation? Would you be comfortable with your emails showing up in a publicly searchable court record even if it was unrelated to you? People have forgotten the basic premise that was drilled into my head when email first arrived -- don't write down anything you wouldn't be comfortable posting in public for the world to see.

Executives are one of the last groups of people in a company to have the privilege of not communicating via email, text, etc. Everywhere I've worked, the execs' secretaries were the only ones sending out emails (logged in as the exec.) This is a big problem in the finance industry, because only the mid-level and below is captured in electronic communication. It makes it extremely hard to build a body of evidence in any legal case directly affecting the executives of a company. It's one of the reasons why lawsuits target the company only, and end with a settlement where the company does not admit any fault.

Re:That defines separation of class

[vux984]

You know you are in the underclass when you find it useful to have proof of what you have done.

You know you are in the upper class when you find it useful to not have any proof of what you have done.

I suspect its more like...

you know you did something where you are in the right when you find it useful to have proof of what you said and did.

you know you are in the wrong (illegal, unethical, whatever) when you find it useful not to have any proof of what you said or did.

While there is a correlation between the 'upper class' behaving illegally and unethically, and the 'under class' trying to keep the shit from landing on them there are plenty of (bottom class) criminals who (if they have 2 cells in their brains to rub together) also know better than to leave a 'paper trail'.

Re:That defines separation of class

[taustin]

Criminals with two brain cells to rub together aren't bottom class criminals, they're lawyers and politicians.