Career | Email Etiquette
Tuesday, December 15th, 2009
Email Etiquette. Wow.
I think most of my peeps have already figured this out, but I’m not a heavy ‘Forward’ reader. It’s not that I don’t enjoy reading useful tidbits, or laughing, or smiling, or saving a child, or getting good luck, or getting a cheque in the mail, or any other fun stuff like that. That’s not it.
It’s because, for the most part, I have more than enough more pressing original mail to respond to, that I’m already behind on. It’s not that I absolutely do not read forwards, because I do; I just read forwards from certain people. People who, with time, I’ve come to realize forward with a purpose.
Here are some tips that we can all heed on being email Savvy
1. Don’t Spam
Give the forward button a day off. Email-forwarding etiquette is a post in itself but here are a few pointers:
Don’t forward things that you don’t read yourself. If you are too busy to read the forward, then the same most likely applies to your friends. Read the information and see if it is applicable to the people you are sending. Create lists if necessary. Don’t cry wolf; if you are that person who’s known for sending arbitrary useless forwards, no-one is going to know, or care, when you have something useful, or important, to say.
If you must forward, because the information is ‘important’ or ‘relevant’, make sure to clean up the email. It’s a ‘forward’, so it’s been passed on, and on, and on, and on, but there’s no need for everyone to read that. Scrolling down 2.4 MB of useless email addresses and personal signature data is enough to make even the people who enjoy reading forwards, opt to click delete halfway down the page.
And remove the 10,000 “Fwd”s in the subject line. The less de-cluttered you make the email, the greater the chances that people will read the ‘important’ information that it contains. If you find that cleaning up forwards is too much work, just delete it and move on.
2. Protect people’s privacy
Internet privacy is a hot topic these days, probably because with all people’s dirty media laundry being strung on front street, the low wattage light bulb is finally starting to flicker.
The people on your list are your friends yes, but they aren’t necessarily friends of each other. Friendship aside, it’s just rude to volunteer people’s personal information like that. Consider email information like a phone number and handle it with the same amount of care.
Unless it’s a group of people who normally talk to each other – like family perhaps, or the email is part of a group discussion, address everyone in the ‘Bcc”(Blind Carbon Copy) rather than the ‘To” Field.
3. Have an appropriate signature
Email signatures, like the way you dress, can say a lot about you to the world. Sometimes giving people too much creativity can work against them, so do bear this in mind when you decide to attach a signature. Ensure that it reflects the image that you would like to project to the world because, as we will soon explore, emails (of any nature) may be forwarded.
Keep the animation and flash work at bay. Innovative yes, but not appropriate.
This also goes for your email font, two words – Eye Care.
Italicized Fushia pink Comic Sans?… oh gosh man. No-one over 15 years maximum should be still writing a full email in those fonts. You are well over that age, keep it simple and eye friendly.
These last two are particularly linked to your career.
4. Refrain from sending NSFW emails
Please, do not forward NSFW (Not Safe For Work) emails to your friend’s corporate email address(es). If the emai by passes the company’s filter and does find itself in your friend’s inbox, understand that the Big Boys over at the company’s IT department are gonna know that your buddy, and their employee is taking in the Freaky Freaky at work. Although this may not affect your friend’s work performance, it’s not a good look.
This type of action is against the email and internet policies of most companies and is clearly stated in their Employee Handbook.
Naturally NSFW email senders, don’t send these emails from your company email either. Logging into your private email address at your work station and engaging in these activities doesn’t count as ‘private’. If you must, do it from your alternate email address from an alternate location.
5. Check, double check and triple check.
Take the time out to formulate your emails before you send them.
Even though it may be casual banter, or maybe the colleague is your friend, do see that your thoughts are expressed clearly and in standard English. No IM/ text/ bbm or any other Instant Messaging language in your emails. There’s no character limit here and besides, it’s not professional.
Your emails go on your permanent record.
Just like your tweets (Twitter), or your Facebook status updates or posts or what have you, because you can delete them from your inbox or your account doesn’t mean that they no longer exist.
Even if it’s a one liner, remember that all and any email, can and may be forwarded, accidentally or intentionally. There are other grammatical ways of appearing to be ‘informal’ or ‘casual’ in an environment that is always formal.
If you aren’t versed in Business Writing, just err on the side of being too formal and stick to basic Standard English. Don’t try to be smart or witty in professional emails; There’s nothing like the ‘words without intonation’ combo to royally screw up good intentions.
Of course any personal grievances, ‘back chat’, ‘lip’ or any other behaviour that you’d rather no-one see, for example the person who you are upset with, should not be documented via email, or voice mails while we are at it.
This may sound obvious but it’s amazing how very little heed is paid to this advice, because after all, these things don’t happen to us. I’m sure a certain athlete, who shall remain nameless, thought the same thing.
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There is a lot that can be written on this topic. Do you have any more tips?
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Thanks for the tips!
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