Page 96 - Warwickers Communication Counts v2015
P. 96
96 TOOLKIT EMAIL DO’S email do
1. Do clearly state in the headline the objective of sending the email to
this person with the relevant subject title i.e. action, read,
information. If someone needs to urgently action something – let
them know in the first line with the deadline.
2. Do try to review the message content before you send it out for
clarity of structure and brevity. Many people read emails on their
phones so the first few lines need to summarise the whole message.
3. Do make sure that the content is relevant to the recipient – match
the communication tone and style to the person and their
communication preference to get a response rather than a reaction.
4. Do work through multiple email cc’s to leaders to ensure they know
who has received the email in their team but they only get one copy.
5. Do check your mail regularly and always reply promptly - even if a
brief acknowledgment is all you can manage.
6. Do be polite. Terseness can be misinterpreted. Seek to ask rather
than tell.
7. Do try to quote from the original message where relevant. You can
break the quoted message down into paragraphs and comment on
them individually to make it clearer.
8. Do include your email signature with contact details on your email
messages.
9. Do be careful when replying to mailing list messages, or to messages
sent to many recipients. Are you sure you want to reply to the whole
list?
10. Do tell your correspondent if you forward a message to somebody
else to deal with, so they know who to expect a reply from.
11. Do read the company email policy to understand the rules re
confidentiality and personal emails.
NB: Some may think it is a little old fashioned to still include email but it is still a regular ‘big’ issue during communication audits.
1. Do clearly state in the headline the objective of sending the email to
this person with the relevant subject title i.e. action, read,
information. If someone needs to urgently action something – let
them know in the first line with the deadline.
2. Do try to review the message content before you send it out for
clarity of structure and brevity. Many people read emails on their
phones so the first few lines need to summarise the whole message.
3. Do make sure that the content is relevant to the recipient – match
the communication tone and style to the person and their
communication preference to get a response rather than a reaction.
4. Do work through multiple email cc’s to leaders to ensure they know
who has received the email in their team but they only get one copy.
5. Do check your mail regularly and always reply promptly - even if a
brief acknowledgment is all you can manage.
6. Do be polite. Terseness can be misinterpreted. Seek to ask rather
than tell.
7. Do try to quote from the original message where relevant. You can
break the quoted message down into paragraphs and comment on
them individually to make it clearer.
8. Do include your email signature with contact details on your email
messages.
9. Do be careful when replying to mailing list messages, or to messages
sent to many recipients. Are you sure you want to reply to the whole
list?
10. Do tell your correspondent if you forward a message to somebody
else to deal with, so they know who to expect a reply from.
11. Do read the company email policy to understand the rules re
confidentiality and personal emails.
NB: Some may think it is a little old fashioned to still include email but it is still a regular ‘big’ issue during communication audits.
