Don't Touch That 'Send' Button! - e-mail messaging skills

HR Magazine, July, 2001 by Andrea C. Poe

The reason is obvious, says Coralee Whitcomb, the Braintree, Mass.-based president of Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility. "There's no body language, tone of voice, eye contact. So, people often leap to the worst conclusions," she says.

To reduce the potential for misunderstandings, Pritchard recommends going over a few sample e-mails in training. "First, have everyone read emails silently. Then, have them read [the e-mailsl out loud. They will see how they come across and how easy it is to misunderstand their intention," he says.

HR should encourage managers to read e-mail messages a couple of times before hitting the "send" button. "I see it all the time in our office, how people dash off e-mail messages without checking what's in there, if they've said what they meant and to see if the grammar is correct," says Edie Hedlin, director of the Smithsonian Institute Archives in Washington, D.C. While the Smithsonian doesn't yet provide e-mail training to cover these issues, Hedlin hopes it will. "We certainly could use it," she says.

In addition, each e-mail message should be self-contained. "One subject, one message," Beaudu says. "People don't want to read long, winding e-mails and wonder what's important."

"Teach [managers] how to be precise and focused so they don't waste time and so they are sure they aren't being misunderstood," recommends Pritchard.

Don't Overdo It

In addition to the content of e-mail messages, managers also should be aware of the management considerations of e-mail use. For instance, the sheer volume of e-mail messages--including mass e-mails that are of little or no concern to the recipients--causes much more frustration among workers than is necessary.

Scott Jensen, an instructor at Salisbury State University on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, says he's bombarded with too many e-mails. "I get something from every office--HR, diversity, the provost's office, the president's [office]--and [from] my bosses," he says. "It's so frustrating to have to sift through e-mail for an hour or two every day."

Managers shouldn't contribute to the heavy load. "Managers, like everyone else, have to be respectful of other people's time," Cunningham says. "If you can get managers to be more efficient in sending e-mails, you're going to save your staff time, which saves your organization money.

Another way to improve efficiency is to encourage managers to use detailed subject lines so that recipients can decide quickly whether the message is relevant to them.

"I wind up deleting a lot of e-mail that's probably important because there's no subject or the subject line is misleading," says Jensen.

Cunningham suggests being as detailed as room allows: "Say 'Meeting on Tuesday at 9 a.m.' That way, they don't even have to open the e-mail to get your message.

Know When Not to E-Mail

While e-mail is a fast, easy and convenient communication tool, it's not always the best choice. Certain kinds of information such as layoffs and firings should be off limits to e-mails.