Write or speak to your manager: choosing a channel for ambiguity
In a reporting relationship, communication can fail even when no information is missing: the two people simply interpret it differently. The useful question is therefore specific: when should you move from writing to a conversation with your manager?
What the literature establishes
Richard L. Daft and Robert H. Lengel (1986, Management Science) distinguish a lack of information from equivocality, meaning the presence of several possible interpretations. Their theoretical framework proposes matching a channel’s richness to this second difficulty: opportunities for immediate questions and access to multiple cues help people build shared meaning. In a relationship with a manager, this means distinguishing a missing fact, which writing may supply, from an interpretation that needs discussion.
In writing, tone seems clearer to the sender
Justin Kruger, Nicholas Epley, Jason Parker and Zhi-Wen Ng (2005, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology) show experimentally that people overestimate their ability to convey tone by email. Part of the problem lies in the difficulty of stepping outside one’s own intention, which the recipient cannot hear. An employee may therefore believe they have expressed a reservation cautiously, while their manager lacks the same cues for interpreting it.
The hasty conclusion
One might conclude that speaking should always replace writing whenever a subject becomes sensitive. These studies do not support that general prescription: a conversation guarantees neither agreement nor an accurate record of what was decided. A reasonable option is to discuss the ambiguity and then briefly document the understanding reached; this is a practical implication, not a protocol validated by these two articles. (our executive and employee training programmes)
What these studies cannot settle
The first article develops an organisational framework rather than reporting a trial comparing exchanges between employees and managers. The experiments in the second concern email communication and do not reproduce all the constraints of an ongoing reporting relationship. Neither justifies a universal message threshold beyond which people should call, or automatic generalisation to all current messaging platforms.
A practical check in Sion
In Sion, as part of SHR’s programme on building an effective relationship with your manager, an employee–manager pair can test a rule for two weeks: when an exchange reveals two different interpretations, suggest a short conversation and then write a summary for confirmation or correction. Possible settings include hydropower coordination, an administrative handover in healthcare, grape-harvest preparation or planning guest services in Alpine tourism, without departing from mandatory procedures. For each episode, record the initial channel and check at the next agreed follow-up whether both people still share the same understanding of the action, its owner and its deadline. The proportion of episodes requiring further clarification provides a local indicator to monitor, not causal proof that the rule works. To go further: explore the Building an Effective Relationship with Your Manager training in Sion in the canton of Valais, or browse our executive and employee training programmes in Switzerland.
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