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Who wouldn’t love e-mail? It’s easy, fast, and gives you the ability to deliver lots of information to a practically unlimited audience, all while sitting at your desk eating lunch.
Recognize that your inbox is
your to-do list. Think of it as such and
treat it as such. So before you fire off that next message, ask yourself these questions: Does this really need to be sent? Just because you CAN send information faster than ever before doesn't mean that you SHOULD send it. Think before you write, and think MORE before you forward on an e-mail someone sent to you. Just because you were mildly amused by a joke or cartoon doesn’t mean you should send it to everyone on your distribution list. Don’t send chain letters through e-mail, and don’t send replies to "all recipients" unless there is a very specific need for everyone to receive the message. It wastes disk space, clutters up inboxes and can be annoying to those who receive dozens, even hundreds of e-mail messages a day. Think about your readers' perspective make certain you’re sending a message that will be welcome and relevant. Will I regret this later? Make no mistake about it - There is no such thing as a private e-mail. Once you hit the “send” button (actually, as soon as you type on your keyboard) you should consider your message public, because someone other than your intended recipient CAN read it, and you may be surprised where your message ends up. In addition, your message will live on for a long, long time, so don’t send anything by e-mail that you would not want posted on the company bulletin board, or published in the community newspaper. A good rule of thumb is this: if you’re debating whether or not to send something personal by e-mail, then don’t do it. Either deliver it by hand or send it by snail mail. Have I made this as brief as possible?
Your e-mails should be
concise and to the point. Think of them as
telephone conversations, except you’re
typing instead of speaking. Brevity is power
when it comes to e-mail communication, and
the last thing most people want to see is a
message from someone who thinks he/she is
the next Dickens. So save your longer
messages, lengthy musings and formal reports
for snail or overnight mail. Don't get caught up in excessive punctuation, such as a dozen exclamation points at the end of a sentence. If something is important it should be reflected in your text, not in your punctuation. AND DON'T TYPE IN ALL CAPS! Remember, if you emphasize everything, you will have emphasized nothing. Don't type in all lower case letters either. If you violate the rules of English grammar and usage, you make it difficult for the reader to read.
Use white space to break your
message into readable chunks, and minimize
fancy formatting. Using HTML, or Rich Text
Format, to format messages so that they have
special fonts, colors, etc. is asking for
trouble. There are lots of e-mail clients
(and some servers) that can’t handle
messages in these formats. The message will
come in as utter gibberish or in the worst
case, crash the e-mail client. Use the Subject line to get the reader's attention. Replace vague lines (Information on XYZ Project, or Status Report Q1) with better hooks: Take 20 Seconds to read this!, Exciting News on Our Project!, Serious Problems! How personal is too personal? Do you open your e-mail message with "Dear Sir", "Dear Mr. Smith", "Joe" or something else? In non-business situations, it’s fine to bypass the standard formalities, just as if you were jotting down a quick note to a friend. But in the business world, it’s much more complicated. Each situation will need to be evaluated on its on, but in general, use the following as a guide: If you normally address a person as Miss/Mrs./Ms./Mr. Smith then that's the way to initially address them in e-mail. If you normally call them by their first name then that should be reflected in your salutation. If you’re unsure, stick to the formal salutation. It's the safest bet. Smilies Since there are no visual or auditory cues with e-mail, users have come up with something called "smilies" to mimic the facial expressions and body gestures that convey emotion in one-on-one conversations. They are simple strings of characters that are interspersed in the e-mail text, and the most common example is :-). Turn your head to the left and you should see a happy face (the colon are the eyes, the dash is the nose and the parentheses is the mouth).
While these can certainly add
a more conversationally dimension to your
email communication, use them sparingly,
especially in business communications.
Whether your training need is small and focused, or enterprise-wide, you can count of Frontline Learning to deliver. For more than 20 years we have been helping organizations achieve their business objectives with targeted training initiatives.
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