Email Etiquette
Monday May 12, 2008
As a professor, I can't begin to tell you how often I receive inappropriate and unprofessional emails from students. While a lot of people understand the importance of following certain rules when writing a business letter, they often forget these rules when composing an email message. Begin practicing good email habits this summer. These tips, from About Career Planning Guide, Dawn Rosenberg McKay, will help you write professional emails so that your message gets across as you intend.
Comments
Hi Tara,
The tips (link to the tips) you provided misses one point, i.e., the length of the email.
As email can not replace letter, then it can’t be as long as it can be. And as some people considers that lots of things are important, so although email should be concise and to the point, still these people will make a long email. There are two possibilities if there are lots of points to communicate:
1. Put the explanation as attachment while the summary is in the email body
2. Warn the reader that the email is lengthy at the very beginning (actually the warning is advised to be the first sentence of the email)
Hope this helps.
That’s such an important point! Thank you. Email can’t take the place of a conversation. Honestly, I usually stop reading when an email becomes too long and simply reply that the student should schedule a meeting or we have a conference call. Concise emails are critical. Thanks for this reminder!