Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
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Avoid pointless replies:
The canonical example of a pointless reply is “Me
too,” where multiple people are discussing some topic and the only contribution
of your message is that you agree. Once again, the question to ask yourself is
whether the recipient(s)
need
to know what you're saying—whether it will help
them. If not, don't send the message.
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Respect the recipient's time:
Although I've written some epic email mes-
sages in my time, email as a medium works best for relatively short mes-
sages—especially when you're composing or reading on a mobile device. Mes-
sages that go on and on with needless details or elaborate stories are more likely
to be ignored—or to have delayed replies. So, do your best to be concise but also
include all essential information, because a series of back-and-forth “Wait, what
did you mean by
x?
” messages wastes everyone's time.
And remember: even though you may have all the time in the world, the person
you're writing to may be extremely busy. Messages that cover a
single
topic,
and do so in a compact and straightforward way, are the most likely to merit
someone's attention.
It seems kind of crazy to me that I should be giving a “do unto others” speech like this in
2014, but judging by the email I get every day, far too many people still haven't got the mes-
sage (so to speak) that politeness in email is a virtue. So, practice and preach all these things,
and it'll raise the level of email interaction for all of us.
Those major points out of the way, I want to turn to a few issues that are a bit more mechan-
ical in nature, such as choosing the best format for your message, being smart with message
attachments, and quoting effectively.
Choose Formatting Wisely
When composing an email message, there are two potential formats you can use:
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Plain text:
Plain text
includes text only, without custom fonts, styles, or other
formatting. Plain text is ideal when readability is paramount.
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Rich text:
Rich text,
which is Apple's way of referring to
HTML
(the system of
tags used to create Web pages), gives you formatting options such as font, size,
style, color, bulleted and numbered lists, and adjustable indentation. You can-
not, however, manually edit the HTML code in your outgoing email messages.
In most cases, the simplicity and universality of plain text outweigh the creative control of
HTML.
