One day in early September a PhD student in associate professor Henrik Helligsø Jensen’s research group dropped into his supervisor’s office. He was fed up because his new e-mail address was going to prevent him having access to some databases that he needed in his work – access was linked to his current mail account. So they both went to see secretariat manager Jens Wejlby Clausen to get an explanation.

What Clausen said

When Jensen returned to his office shortly afterwards, he sat down at his computer immediately. Clausen had done his best to explain a decision which the senior management team had made a couple of years previously. The consequence of this decision was that a lot of staff members would soon be forced to change the name they had been using in front of the @ sign in their e-mail addresses.

Jensen got slightly hot under the collar during the conversation, especially when Clausen said (with just a trace of irony in his voice): “So you can just calm down because it’ll be your turn soon. Lots of us are going to be given new e-mail addresses.”

Jensen protests

“A process has been launched leading to changes in our e-mail addresses (…),” wrote Jensen by way of introduction to his brief letter of protest. He continued: “This feels like an unwarranted interference in our psychological working environment, because it will affect our sense of identity and the name that people have known us by for many years.”

The storm clouds gather

Once he had finished his letter of protest, Jensen printed it out and went round to every single office at the Department of Chemistry in the University Park in Aarhus asking his academic colleagues to sign the letter. Some of them were away, but all the colleagues that Jensen was able to find signed immediately – a total of 30 out of the 34 tenured researchers at the department.

Dear Brian

Jensen was happy about this result as he sat down again to write an e-mail to his rector, dean and head of department on Wednesday 11 September. The letter started “Dear Brian, Niels Christian and Ib”, and continued as follows: “Some people at the Department of Chemistry have had their e-mail accounts shut down, and it has come to my attention that the same fate awaits all of us. (…) The attached list of signatures demonstrates the level of deep dissatisfaction regarding the upcoming changes in our e-mail addresses. A lot of people regard this as harassment, and in our view it constitutes a major barrier to the smooth operation of the university, as well as being an incomprehensible and unnecessary decree from the senior management.”

I wonder if he’s right

Rector Brian Bech Nielsen read Jensen’s e-mail. He thought “I wonder if he’s right,” and decided to ask the university director Jørgen Jørgensen and the vice director of AU IT Flemming Bøge to clarify the issue. The rector didn’t hear any arguments to persuade him that the senior management team’s decision should be upheld. So by arrangement with the management he decided to change it. He saw no reason to annoy his staff unnecessarily.

So what’s in a name?

Shortly afterwards Henrik Helligsø Jensen received an e-mail from the rector agreeing with his point of view. Bech Nielsen said he accepted Jensen’s arguments, and the e-mail made it clear that the rector would be changing the decision. Jensen was happy. A lot of his colleagues had been quite willing to sign the letter of protest, but said they definitely didn’t expect the letter to have any influence on the decision. Jensen hadn’t been expecting much either; so he was absolutely delighted.

So what’s in a name? Well, sometimes quite a lot, actually.

FACTS

You can read more about the consequences of the changes in the management’s decision at:

• New email addresses - the most important questions