The preferred email

Joan Waldvogel is studying the use of email in the workplace for her PhD at the Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand. Her research included a survey on attitudes to email. Out of this have emerged these tips for good email composition.

Emails need a subject line which clearly defines the topic. It is important for the recipient to know if they need to read the message and how urgent it is unless it is part of an on-going dialogue. This provides a personal touch and can help to establish a positive tone in an email.

Message content should be:

• Concise and to the point. Messages that are longer than half a page may be better sent as attachments as long emails are difficult to read.
• Clear, coherent, unambiguous and accurate.
• Courteous and avoids the use of unnecessary capital letters, exclamation marks, underlining and the colour red. These can convey anger.
• Sparing in its use of emoticons or smiley faces, as many people don't like these.
• Work-related and relevant to the recipient.

Other suggestions included:

• Avoid sending email to someone sitting physically close. In general, people do not appreciate being sent an email by someone who could easily pass on that message in person.
• Don't foward non-related work messages, as these can be time consuming and annoying for the receiver.
• Reply promptly in acknowledgement.
• Exercise discretion because email is a written record and a public medium.

Comments

[Michael Fitzgibbon]

Great tips! You might also be interested in Tips for Mastering E-mail Overload that I mentioned at this post