Take a Second Look at Your Emails

Today's lesson comes from my day at work. I have an office-oriented job where most of my work is on a computer. For the past few days, I've been trying to get a piece of information for a project. To speed things up, I contacted more than one source for this info, in hopes that one of them would help out. Leaving out a lot of details, I received an email that appeared to me to a little stinging and curt. I have never met the sender and so I have no idea what tone the email was meant to be. But it came across to me as negative. It may or may not have been intended that way, but that's how I received it. My apologies if I misread the message.

There are many people sending out many emails each day. Some for business and some for other social reasons. The take home lesson is take a second look at your emails before sending them. Think of how it may sound to the person receiving it. Will they receive it in the tone that you meant? Would you regret it if anyone else read it? Is the email even necessary or would some other form of communication work? Maybe you need to cool your jets and do nothing?

Yes, it is true that we can't control how others react. I've come across some who are eagerly looking for opportunities to get mad/offended. Those people will find what they're looking for, whether you get involved or not. If you stop and take a hard look at your emails before sending them, you might not only sidestep a few arguments, but life will go a bit more smoothly. Who knows? You might be more effective at your job.

Maybe you don't send very many emails. Perhaps there's another form of communication that you could substitute in for email. Speech, body language, etc. The take home lesson should still apply and the benefits should be similar.