Email Business Etiquette

Email Etiquette 

Now that people are checking email remotely, over the Web, over cell phones and smart phones, their needs and expectations have changed.  New technology and people’s comfort with email mean that the old etiquette rules need some updates. 

For example, you used to hear that your Subject line should give as accurate a description as possible of the contents of the message; for example, you should never give an email the subject line, “Question”.  Nowadays, while accuracy is still important, brevity is equally vital.  If your recipient is reading your email off a BlackBerry, a long subject line will run off the screen and be useless.

Here are a few perennial tips as well as a few new ones that should keep you in your email correspondents’ good graces: 

1. If you’re sending an attachment, attach it FIRST before you write the message so that you remember to do it.  A few years ago, it was hardly rare to see an attachment referred to in a message but not included.  Nowadays it’s unusual enough that you could start to look like a flake. 
2. Check the To, CC and BCC fields, particularly if you’re about to Reply To All.  Are you absolutely certain you want everybody on that list to read your response?  Copy co-workers and bosses only when there’s a reason to do so. 
3. Nix the fancy backgrounds.  They just add to the size of individual emails; many email programs won’t display them anyhow, and they can make your message difficult to read.
4. Keep subject lines short, summarizing what your message is truly about.  This helps get your message read and also helps if you have to search for a message later on.  Keep the text short.  In the new era of smartphones, more and more people are checking email over the phone.  That means screen real estate and bandwidth are both scarce – so don’t make it difficult for people to download or view your messages by making them any longer than they need to be.  Additionally, the email has evolved from something like a letter to something like a Post-It note.  Nobody has the time or the patience for a multi-paragraph email; if it takes that much space to convey and idea, consider picking up the phone instead.
5. Pause for a salutation.  We are always grateful to be greeted with politeness and humanity.  It’s more and more common to start with your recipient’s name and a dash or comma.  This also signals that it is a personal communication and not spam or a broadcast to the group. 
6. Include pleasantries.  In the elevator, we say, “Good morning.”  At a co-worker’s office door we ask a greeting question.  There are the lubricants of daily interaction.  Some emails are more formal than others, but the vast majority move between two people who might just as easily be saying hello in the hall.  In your email, consider the same pleasantry you might employ in a conversation:  Before you launch into your three points of action from the previous meeting, consider saying “It was good to talk with the group today.”  Or if it’s an individual, “It was good to hear about your trip to Cancun.” Why?  It makes life more pleasant and your reader more apt to enjoy the message.
7. NO SHOUTING!  All caps in emails have the same effect as shouting in conversation.  It’s considered rude.  Even an all cap word here and there is iffy, since it takes the reader aback.
8. Proof and spell-check.  A poorly written message replete with run-on sentences, omitted punctuation, misused or misspelled words is difficult to read, easy to misunderstand – and reflects poorly on the sender.  (And no one will ever tell you if you’ve made an embarrassing error.)
9. Beware of the negative.  Email is great for conveying information, instructions, and objective facts.  But for some reason it slams  harder in an email.  It is rarely a good idea to send anything negative online.  If the news is that bad, it should be delivered face to face, or at least by phone, so that your facial expression or the sound of your voice can soothe and explain tough news.  A good rule is, “Never say anything in an email you wouldn’t say to the person’s face.” 
10. Remember, it’s public.  Emails are forwarded from person to person, often multiple times, with forwarders often forgetting a nugget to “touchy” or classified information that appeared several messages below.  Before you send an email ask yourself, “Am I willing to post this on my office door?”  And emails can legitimately be perused by employers and often subpoenaed in legal cases, sometimes going back years.
11. Be careful about humor.  Always a two-edged sword, humor can be extremely touchy in email.  Sarcasm is easily misunderstood and may come across as insulting.  If you must make a light comment, it’s often a good idea to use a smiley-face or emotion – to make sure a recipient knows you’re kidding. 
12. Never respond in anger.  First, if someone has insulted you, it may well be a miscommunication, a lame attempt to be funny, or it might be a response to a hasty email of yours.  Pick up the phone and ask, “What was that about?”  A double caution is, Never ‘Reply to All’ in anger.  This is a good way to make an enemy for life.
13. Multiple questions.  If you ask a series of questions, most responders will answer only the last question asked.  If you are posing a series of questions, number them.  This is also a good idea for multiple pieces of information.  It simply helps the reader order the information.  If you are responding to a series of questions, number them in your reply and use a different color to set your replies off from the questions.
14. The shorter the better.  Something about a long email can make a reader say, “Oh, no.”  Shorter ones are better read and more quickly responded to.  If you find yourself responding to an emotional situation with a three-page, single-spaced rehashing of events, consider the possibility that email is not the best medium for working out the situation.
15. If you are changing the subject, don’t continue an email thread. Start a new email.
16. Kick the forwarding habit.  Everyone get too much mail already.  If you can’t resist broadcasting jokes, inspirational stories and political diatribes, consider saving them for friends and family – and realize that we’ve all seen most of them already. 
17. Sign-off: Consider the same pleasantry and sign off as you would use in a letter.  “Please let me know if I can be of further assistance.  Best regards, Brooks.”
18. Say “please” and “thank you”. Your grandmother was right, “They’re the three most valuable words in the English language; they don’t  cost you a thing, and they pay dividends your whole life long.”  In email, as in life, a little courtesy goes a long way. 

 Dian Lusher-Interpersonal Communications Trainer and Coach

DYNEL, Inc. www.dynelinc.net