March 28, 2010
No Naked Emails!
Almost everyone has had that dream – you know, that one where you go to an important event and start mingling in the crowd – then realize in horror that you forgot to dress!! Gratefully you wake up, and after a few minutes the only remnants of the experience is in your mind.
Unfortunately, too many people are making a very similar mistake every day – and leaving permanent records of their carelessness. Even worse, these records are often forwarded to other people, even groups of people, spreading a message about you that wasn’t your intention at all.
I’m talking about your emails, of course. This powerful communication tool is invaluable in today’s business world, but frequently people under-estimate the impact of proper formatting and etiquette. In essence, they send out “naked” emails – messages that are improperly formatted, misspelled, use poor grammar, etc….. It’s like not bothering to get dressed before you leave the house.
Why does this happen?
Online communication is truncated
Some people are used to online short speak, and Twitter messaging where normal written rules don’t apply. However, it’s not a good idea to bring these habits into your emails. A real world example – a meeting invitation was sent out, and in response, one upper level manager replies:
ill C U there
I would expect that from a teenager … not a business professional. Personally, it did not make me believe that person was “hip” or “young”; instead, I felt that he didn’t care about the written image of him that was presented, and, in equal proportion, that he didn’t care enough about my opinion to take just a minute to type a whole response.
Busy people cut corners
I received an email from my daughter’s teacher one day. It was intended to introduce herself and let me know that she was available to communicate with – messages that I truly valued. However, she left two misspelled words (I prayed they were typos), didn’t use proper capitalization, and used run on sentences. All this was in an email that was no more than four sentences. This teacher intended to make me think – Great! I can easily talk to my child’s teacher. Instead, my thought was – How on earth is this person qualified to teach children, and how quickly can we change classes? I am still appalled at this message. It was sent to the parents of 30 children, and I’m guessing somewhere between 30-60+ people read it. If she had spent five minutes or less to run spellcheck and proofread for content and grammar, this message would have come across in a professional, friendly tone and her intent would have been accomplished. I understand that she was probably busy and hurried; but if she didn’t care enough to present herself properly to her students’ parents – how does she approach her teaching? Don’t cut corners in your emails – they can and will be used against you.
Perception of email is “casual”
Many people treat their emails as virtual extensions of office shout-outs, ignoring traditional formatting such as address, body, structure, and a close. Your email will live on after you have sent it. It may get forwarded to other people, it may live on in a communication thread, it may be referenced a year later when someone needs to look up information it contained. This is anything but casual communication, and you’ll be doing yourself a great disservice if you forget this.
Your emails go out and represent you, and by extension, your company. Take a few extra minutes to make sure you are writing a whole message, with a greeting, a body, and a thank you statement. Sign your name and include your contact information – this is easily done using an email signature, and ensures that if people need to contact you outside of email, they can do so. Follow these simple practices and it will be well worth the time spent.
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