E-mail Etiquette
There are a few important points to remember when composing a professional email. Be sure to include a meaningful subject line; this helps clarify what your message is about and may also help the recipient prioritize reading your email.
- Just like a written letter, be sure to open your email with a formal greeting.
- Use standard spelling, punctuation, and capitalization. THERE’S NOTHING WORSE THAN AN EMAIL SCREAMING A MESSAGE IN ALL CAPS.
- Write clear, short paragraphs and be direct and to the point.
- Be friendly and cordial. Jokes and witty remarks may be inappropriate and may not come across as intended in email.
- Try to respond within a reasonable time frame.
- If someone asks a lot of questions, it may be OK to embed your answers into the sender’s message copied at the bottom of your email, but indicate that at the top.
Never send the following information over email:
- Usernames and passwords.
- Credit card or other account information.
- Any sensitive information that could be potentially damaging to someone’s career and/or reputation.
- Unsolicited attachments. These often get deleted.
- Unnecessarily large files. Learn how to resize digital photos and other image files.
- When you must send a large files, send an email explaining what to expect and why.
Email Listservs and Discussion Groups
- Double-check the To: area of your email when you reply. Too many people have intended to reply to a message poster alone when, in fact, their reply went to the entire list—much to their embarrassment. If you want to be extra-careful, start a new email and type the single recipient’s address.
- Do not air your grievances or beefs about your school, colleagues, or employer on a list. Personal attacks should also be avoided. Such postings make the organization you are associated with look bad, while also making you sound like a gossip and whiner. Particularly on large lists, you also may not know who else is on it. Be professional, and likewise avoid piling onto discussions about who’s got it worst at work, school, etc.
- If you are new to a discussion list, just be a reader for a while to get the sense of what the group talks about, how it talks about it, and what types of behaviors are expected from list members. Only when you have gotten that sense should you initiate a post.
