People can’t pop in and out of offices or catch up in the halls or chat over coffee, but communication needs to continue, so email now takes center stage, and folks are realizing what we picky communication people have been saying for years:  Email is important!

By which I mean, the quality of email writing is now getting attention.  People have noticed that email is NOT just ‘talking written down’.  Email is writing.  Those who receive the email message aren’t listening to it – they’re reading it, and they don’t have the cues to meaning that they get in an oral communication interaction. They don’t see the facial expressions or body language that modify words, and they don’t hear the tone of voice that contributes to meaning.  They have only words, and often too many of them.  Readers of emails now recognize the frustration of trying to decipher meaning in a tangle of run-on sentences, repetition, casual grammar, creative spelling.  The terms ‘clarity and brevity’ are being more closely considered.

Is it time for your folks to be reminded that the quality of their writing says a lot about them and about your organization?  After all, in these days of working alone, email is important!

Let us help.  Our virtual training sessions are clear and brief and get results.  Contact us for more information today.

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But, no.  Voices continue to be raised about messages that are incomplete, incomprehensible, rude, or appear to have been written by a hamster.

When faced with criticism, many email writers defend their messages by saying that email is informal and is essentially just ‘speaking – on the computer.’

I ask how the recipients ingest the message.  Do they listen to it, as we do when someone speaks?  “No,” say these folks, who act as though I’m a first grader, “They read it, of course.”

I rest my case.

If we produce something for someone to read, we need to produce something that approximates the accepted standards for writing.  Readers expect to understand what they read.  They look for clues such as sentence structure, punctuation, and correct-enough grammar.  And they don’t want to be confused about the sub-text.  (Is she mad at me?  Did I miss something?) And since they can’t speak up, they assume that whatever they asked is going to be answered, and that whatever is being told to them is going to contain all necessary information.

I think we’ve been hearing these concerns since email first entered our lives.  High maintenance, these email readers

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We have an email writing class – do you have anyone who should attend?

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