Today I led a seminar called Email Intelligence with 22 people at the Port of Seattle. Like many of us, Port employees and managers get lots of email on countless topics from all kinds of people both inside and outside their organization. About 70 percent of participants in the class said they spend at least an hour a day reading email. Even more of them spend at least an hour a day writing it. Does that sound like your workday?
With all that experience in the room, I asked participants, in teams, to list their pet peeves as email readers. By “pet peeves,” I meant things that slow them down, drive them nuts, and clog their inboxes. Here is a master list made from their excellent inventories:
- Misspelled words
- Missing punctuation and punctuation errors
- Incorrect grammar
- Acronyms and abbreviations that aren’t clear
- Insufficient detail
- Incomplete information
- Too much information
- Convoluted information
- Information repeated
- In replies, requested information not provided
- Incomplete sentences (Example: “Will handle this.”)
- Too long (They said, “Condense it. Get to the point.”)
- Symbols, that is, smiley faces and other emoticons
- Backgrounds and color (make messages hard to read)
- Multiple questions scattered throughout email (makes it difficult to answer them)
- No subject line
- Subject unclear
- No clear purpose
- No desired outcome
- Unclear deadlines
- No clear request or directions
- Request for confirmation of receipt (in Outlook)
- Wrong name (not being careful about which address you choose from your contact list)
- Using “To” when the message should be a “CC” (This makes it hard to know who is responsible for replying and taking action)
- Using “Reply all” instead of “Reply”
- Careless use of BCC (blind copy)
- Repeated notices of events (They said, “If I want to attend, I will put in on my calendar–don’t keep reminding me.”)
- Multiple emails on the same subject (some forwarded, some repeated)
- Unnecessary messages (The reader asks, “Why me?”)
- Personal email sent companywide
- Phishing (sending email as a scam to get private information)
- Chain letter email
- Political email
- Marketing spam
- Delayed replies, that is, replies after several days
- Extensive replies (“Thank you. . . thank you . . . you’re welcome”)
- No reply
To round out the list to 40, here are three of my own: - Huge paragraphs
- Emailing when talking on the phone is more efficient
- No phone number provided
This is a fine list of what not to do in email. Pass it on. But if you email the link, be sure not to commit any of the no-nos!