Check out my seven deadly sins of email writing and count up how many apply to you.

1. You sometimes send messages without a greeting or a closing.
2. You always use the same ending in every message, like ‘Kind regards’, or ‘Best regards’. In fact, it’s probably part of your automatic email signature.
3. You use lots of template messages that have been around in your company for decades.
4. You often receive replies asking you to clarify things and ask questions because your email wasn’t clear enough.
5. You feel it’s important to write emails in a very different way to how you speak, because it’s a written message and you must be more formal in writing.
6. Your emails are often long and repetitive because you need to say things over in different ways to make sure the reader gets your meaning eventually.
7. You must use phrases like ‘Please be informed…’ or ‘Please be advised…’ at the beginning of sentences because, well, it’s just polite, right?
8. You don’t know the difference between active and passive voice?
9. You were taught that you must write to impress, with big words and long sentences. So, of course, it must be the same now you’re in the workplace.
10. You don’t have time to read your message out loud, as if you are the reader, before hitting ‘send’.

If you answered ‘yes’ to any of these questions, you may be making your email and business writing more difficult than it should be. And more importantly, you’re making reading and responding much more difficult for your reader.

Life is fast paced. Businesses exist to get things done, and email is a large part of that. With limited time and so much mail in our inboxes, readers want to read messages and understand messages easily, and know exactly how to reply. People also want to know they are dealing with humans at the other side of the computer screen, so building relationships is also important.

I know you’re busy, so I’m developing a new series of short videos called ‘Writing Better Emails in English’. Tip 1 is out now on my YouTube channel, and I’m aiming at putting up one a week. Have you got 3 minutes?

Check it out here, and remember to like, subscribe, and add a comment under the video, so we can start a discussion there.

“Why didn’t we learn this at school or college?”

This is a common question in all my email and business writing workshops. It always leads to a discussion about the difference between writing in academic settings, and the writing we do now in the world of work.

Let’s take a look…

In the academic world, our main aims are to pass exams. We have to demonstrate to our lecturers and examiners that we have learned something. We have to argue a case, show how our minds work, or persuade readers of a particular theory. To do this, we need to use:

• more formal writing
• long sentences
• wide vocabulary
• complex language
• often third person
• passive voice

Why? Because we need to IMPRESS readers to demonstrate learning.

In the business world, our main aims are to get things done. We have to solve problems, clarify issues, propose new strategies, negotiate deals, report progress. To do this, we need to get our ideas across quickly, so clarity is key. We must use:

• less formal writing
• short sentences
• simple words
• clear and concise language
• bullets and numbers where possible
• active voice

Why? Because we need to EXPRESS ourselves clearly to get things done.

So why are so many people today writing emails full of long sentences, big words, long-winded paragraphs, passive voice and redundant expressions? They are trying to use the same style of writing that they did in college. This just doesn’t work in today’s fast paced business world.

Roughly 281 billion emails were sent and received each day in 2018. This figure is expected to increase to over 347 billion daily emails in 2022. (statista.com)

We just cannot afford to let this problem keep getting worse.

Whose responsibility is it?

It’s yours. It’s your manager’s. It’s your organisation’s. It’s up to every one of us today. Every single organisation in the world must get to grips with good business writing now. Let’s show our teams the benefit of writing in short sentences, using simple words, active voice, and clear, concise language… before it’s too late!

Want to learn more? Need help?

Email me today at shirley@sttstraining.com… but keep it short and simple, please.

It’s another day at work and you are busy going through your inbox. You open yet another email that looks like a chaotic, muddled-up mess. It looks so bad, you let out a sigh. Then when you do bring yourself to read it, the message is confusing, long-winded, repetitive, wandering all over the place.

Sound familiar?

You know the type of message I’m talking about:

• The message goes on and on… and on.
• There’s very little white space on the screen.
• It seems like a non-stop wall of words and more words.
• The message jumps around from topic to topic.
• The writer says the same things in different places.
• You can’t figure out what reply the writer is wanting.

We collectively send almost 300 billion emails every day. Wouldn’t you think writers would make sure their messages are clear, concise, understandable, and with clear action stated?

But no, the issues persist. As a result, there’s a lot of ‘email ping-pong’ happening in inboxes all over the world. You send a reply querying a message, they reply answering your queries but they miss out a couple of points, you can’t figure it out so you reply again. Ping-pong… ding-dong!!

How many of us are losing time reading emails, trying to decipher messages, missing key information, and wasting time?

Sadly, good communication skills are often overlooked when it comes to writing emails. Many people who would never send out a corporate memo, letter or report without proper care are regularly sending out poorly-written emails.

Why is this?

Just like any other form of communication in business, an email message should be clear, concise, understandable, and, yes, grammatically correct.

So, what’s the best way to ensure you compose well-organised email messages? Follow my four-point plan! It’s so easy, and it works! Here’s a very short extract from my online program High Impact Business Writing, in which I talk about each of the four sections.

Stop thinking about yourself and what you want to say. Think about your reader, and what they need to hear! When you take some time to think about your message and how to structure it effectively, you might save yourself some time, avaoid repetition and misunderstanding, and you’ll help us all to cut down on email ping-pong!

I’d love to hear your thoughts on this important topic. I’ve put this up as an article on LinkedIn. Please join the discussion by leaving a comment. How can we stop this?

Here’s to less ping-pong and more effective emails!

I was really thrilled recently to learn that my book Email Essentials is the #1 book in the USA for publishers Marshall Cavendish International. What amazing news that was! This just shows that email is very much a part of our lives today. And I’m so glad more people are realising this and investing in my book to guide them daily.

It seems that when we get to work, one of the first things we do is check our email. This seems an essential step in setting our pace for the rest of the day. However, even though email has become an integral part of most people’s world, email messages can often be misinterpreted. Why is this? Well, when we have a face-to-face conversation, different parts of our brain separate it into words and ‘melody’ to understand the intonation, mood, emotion, etc.

However, your brain can’t do this when you are reading words on a screen, because often, the underlying messages can get lost or be misinterpreted. This is why it’s really vital to pay attention to both the words you use and the way those words may be understood by the reader.

Different ways of saying the same thing

Naturally, our brains register words and phrases differently, and this could in turn set off emotional triggers in the reader. This is why writing emails needs careful consideration and effort, in case the words we choose send off the wrong signals and message.

Here are some different messages. Which one would you like to receive?

1. “I’m swamped right now. I can’t talk.”
   vs.
   “I’m sorry but I’m busy right now. Can we speak tomorrow morning?”
2. “That draft proposal is so confusing. Let’s talk and get it fixed.”
   vs.
   “I have some questions about your draft. When can we discuss this?”

The more emails you write (and read), you will find out what works and what doesn’t. By reflecting like this, you will learn how best to express your ideas in a way that the reader understands and gets the best results.

Good writing sets you apart

Changing your writing habits and style will take time and effort, but the benefits and rewards will be great. You’ll save time, you’ll save your reader’s time, your reader will understand, you’ll get the right response. Perhaps even more importantly, you’ll cut down all the ‘email ping-pong’ that goes on right now in many mailboxes!

Here’s to your email success!

Shirley

To help you, I’ve put together a checklist of reasons why your writing style may not be working as effectively as it should.

This checklist also contains my top 10 strategies for improving the business writing style throughout your organisation.

Since my recent articles, the conversations about writing style are still continuing, and that’s a good thing. It means people are really thinking about the way you are writing emails and other business documents.

Some people have asked me whether social media has had an impact on our business writing. This is a great question, and the answer is yes.

Social media has reshaped the way we communicate

Younger people in the workplace today were born with social media. They know how to communicate concisely, using fewer words, images, stories. But what happens when they go out into the corporate world?

Very often, they get caught in the prison of the old corporate ways by writing long-winded, template-style jargon that bears little resemblance to a conversation between two real live human beings.

This is probably because they are influenced by what they see other people doing. Perhaps they see colleagues and bosses writing “Please find attached”, “Please be informed”, “Kindly be advised” and “above-mentioned/below-mentioned”, etc, so they just follow suit.

Times change. We must change too.

Within a few decades we’ve gone from horse and carriage to driverless cars. We’ve gone from manual typewriters to super-powered computers. Our whole world has changed. It’s time for our business writing to change too.

Today, readers want to read messages that are simple, clear and understandable. Readers need to know exactly what to do and how to reply. Writers must use plain language that’s easy to write, easy to read, and easy to understand. This involves using short, clear sentences and everyday words, in active voice, with no redundancies. It means writing like a human, not a template!

It’s time to question the norms!

Throughout history, our style of communication has always been shaped by the times we are living in. Right now, it’s 2019, and we are living in Age of Creativity. It’s time to question the norms! Don’t just accept what’s been happening in your company for years, perhaps decades. Do something about it.

It will take only one person to raise the issue in a meeting, or in a discussion with your boss. You could start a huge ripple effect that could really make a difference – a human difference!

So, are you going to question the norms in your organisation? I’d love to know.

How can I help?

Over the past 20 years, I’ve helped a lot of individuals and organisations with this challenge of transforming their writing skills. I’d love to help you and your organisation! Contact me today at shirley@sttstraining.com.

1. Respond to a message as soon as you receive it.

This is common courtesy, even if you have to say that a detailed response will be sent later.

2. Check the email address.

Correctly addressed email messages are delivered within seconds. It can take days to receive an error message letting you know that an incorrectly-addressed message did not get delivered. Keep your online address book up-to-date. Remember, once sent, a message cannot be retrieved. It could be damaging if it is received by the wrong person!

3. Always include a subject heading.

This should give the recipient a good idea of the contents of the message and makes for easier handling and filing. Don’t use subject lines line ‘Enquiry’ or ‘Help needed’ – these are less than useless and may not be read by a busy person scanning the subject lines quickly.

4. Keep caps lock off.

Capitals are difficult to read, they INDICATE SHOUTING and can appear THREATENING! And also don’t use lots of exclamation marks!!***!!!!! also pls don’t use lower case letters with abbreviations n acronyms. if u write in this way u r thought of as lazy and not businesslike!!!*!!!

5. Get your greeting right.

Formality doesn’t read well in email. Replace formal salutations like ‘Dear Pam’ with informal ‘Hi Pam’ or even just ‘Pam’. Similarly replace ‘ Yours sincerely’ with ‘Best wishes’ or even ‘Cheers’. Try to avoid overuse of the very boring ‘Regards’, or worse still abbreviations like “Thks & Rgs” – don’t be lazy! Think of something novel and different – or why not just your name?

6. Keep copies.

Just as you would keep copies of letters, it is good practice to take a hard copy of important emails sent and received.

7. Check your message carefully and get it right first time.

There’s no second chance with emails – once you hit ‘send’ it will be in the recipient’s mailbox within seconds!

8. Do some house-keeping regularly.

Delete or file your old and read messages so as to keep your system fast and efficient. Do your filing and deleting regularly. If you receive copies of emails that you don’t need to see, tell the author so that it doesn’t happen again.

9. Take pride in your message.

When composing on screen, it is easy to allow sentences to become very long. Make an effort to keep sentences short and simple, and check your syntax. The more pride you take in your message composition, the more successful you will be in being understood and achieving the desired results.

10. Do pick up the telephone now and again.

Remember, it’s good to talk!To help you, I’ve put together a checklist of reasons why your writing style may not be working as effectively as it should.

I read recently that 81% of readers felt that poorly written material wastes a lot of time. Yes, 81%!

It’s everyone’s responsibility to stop wasting the reader’s time. So here are five habits you need to stop right now. Why? Because they make you look lazy and unprofessional.

Habit #1. Stop Using Vague Subject Lines

If you expect your readers to open an email, give them some idea of what it’s about. Don’t keep your reader guessing by using vague subject lines, or worse still by changing the content but keeping the same subject line.

Habit #2. Stop Writing In One Long Paragraph

Nothing is more off-putting than opening an email to find it contains just one or two very long paragraphs. Readers will very likely hit ‘delete’. It’s your job to make your message look good. Leave a blank line between paragraphs, start a new paragraph every few lines, and use bullets and numbers where possible.

Habit #3. Stop Sending Vague Messages

It helps if you plan your message before you begin. Follow my four-point plan in every message: start with a nice introduction, give all the details in the central section, then state clearly what action is needed, and then wrap it up with a friendly close. Intro – Details – Action – Close.

Habit #4. Stop Hitting Reply All

When you receive an email with multiple people cc’d, you don’t always need to reply all. Sometimes it’s only the sender who needs a response. So don’t pollute other people’s mailboxes.

Habit #5. Stop Sending Sloppy Messages

If there are some misspelled words, long-winded sentences, old-fashioned jargon, long rambling paragraphs, and no clear action points, you can bet your email may end up in the bin. Let’s stop sending sloppy messages.

For many people, email is the bane of their professional life. Despite the fact that it’s one of the oldest Internet technologies (it’s been around since the 1970s), many people still struggle with managing it effectively. It’s not unusual to see email in-boxes with hundreds – and sometimes even thousands – of messages, which causes the owner stress, frustration and hours of lost productivity each week. Some people simply give up and declare “email bankruptcy”, deleting everything and starting again, assuming that if something was important, the sender will follow up anyway. However, this is only a short-term solution, and before long the empty in-box fills up again.

The most important first step to managing your email is to change your mindset. Rather than seeing it as a necessary evil that’s inevitably going to harm your productivity each day, treat email as a powerful communication tool that can improve your productivity.

Of course, that’s easier said than done. However, I firmly believe that the problem is not with email itself; it’s with the kind of email we receive, the way we perceive email, and the way we manage email:

• We receive some email that’s unnecessary, unwanted, inappropriate, unproductive and unimportant – and that gets in the way of the worthwhile email.
• We often perceive email as being more urgent than it is, and that means we don’t get our important work done.
• We don’t have techniques to manage it, so we feel stressed and overwhelmed by it.

If those problems sound familiar to you, start by adopting these three key principles, which will help you change your attitude towards these problems:

1. Don’t let your in-box set your priorities.
   Your in-box represents other people’s priorities, not yours. So never use it to decide how you’ll plan your day. Be clear about your priorities first, and don’t vary from them unless absolutely necessary.
2. Use email for important, not urgent, issues.
   Email is a deferred communication tool, which means you shouldn’t expect others to read your email immediately, and they shouldn’t expect it of you. Use it for important issues, but use other communication tools for urgent issues.
3. Treat email as just one of many communication channels.
   There’s no law that says you have to do everything by email, and there’s no law that says a conversation that starts by email has to continue that way. Be flexible and willing to switch to other communication channels as needed.

Adopting these principles means changing your attitude towards email, and I hope that this immediately helps you see email in a more positive light.

What percentage of your day would you say it taken up by reading or responding to emails? A recent estimate from Fortune Magazine puts the figure at 28%! Email is fast becoming one of our most essential and pervasive forms of professional communication. How we communicate with people electronically matters. Each word of your email is your representative in a space where you have no voice and are rarely allowed a chance to change a bad first impression.

So what makes a perfect business email? Follow these simple steps:

Enter clearly

The subject line of an email is as important as the body. Put some effort into making a concise subject that conveys the exact nature of the message you are sending. Avoiding an endless string of RE: and FWD: will make the reader more inclined to actually open your note. Avoid using selling language or demands in your subject line. The use of the imperative voice should be reserved for the body text. One useful tactic is to use the colon to separate and expand on a complex idea in the subject line- for example an email post about a suggestion to try a new type of paper for the photocopy machine may have the subject line ” A Suggestion: New Paper” or “Copy Machine: A Suggestion”. This clearly conveys the essence of the message while being pleasingly pithy. When someone receives a well-titled email, they know at a glance that it is important to read and worthy of their attention.

Edit down

Spelling counts, but save your flowery prose. Clearly define the objective and the action you wish the reader to take. Do not pad your message with lengthy explanations and meandering monologues about your hopes and fears. Business emails should be powerful and short. Your email body should be structured logically with the action clearly stated. Try this structure:

Exit gracefully

Your sign off says a lot about you. Try to keep it down to three lines maximum and avoid “inspirational quotes” and strings of descriptive adjectives here. If your phone slaps on “sent from iPhone” go into settings and turn that off. No one wants to know that you sent it from your phone or tablet.

Include your first and last name, followed by your role in the business most relevant to the subject of the email or business relationship only. Don’t include your degrees and all your life accomplishments. Keep it simple.

Your communication should be much more clear and concise if you follow these three Es.

Email doesn’t only come to our desks. Many of us now carry email around with us on our mobile phones. This often results in being on call 24 hours a day, every day, even on weekends. Apart from never being free from the demands of work, this also leads to many more challenges.

Messages typed with our thumbs often contain errors and can end up becoming quite terse. You might include a tagline such as ‘Sent from my Blackberry’, thinking that your recipient may be more forgiving of mistakes or brusqueness. But think again. This may not always work.

A friend told me recently that he now does 75 per cent of his emailing through his mobile phone, and that he has adopted a new language for this new medium. Things he would not normally do on his computer, such as abbreviating words or not starting off with a greeting, he is actually doing on his electronic device.

Consider this message that he may have sent if he’d been sitting at his computer:

Hi John

Great to hear from you, I’m glad you can come down to Singapore next week to discuss this exciting project. If you can let me have your proposal within the next couple of days, I can discuss it with our management and send you any urgent questions for consideration before we meet.

Look forward to seeing you,
Michael

Now imagine how the message might look if he sent if from his electronic device:

Pls send yr proposal so I can put to mgnt and send you any q’s. Tnks.

(Sent from my Blackberry)

Do you see what I mean about the message becoming abrupt? It could actually ruin the personal rapport that Michael may have built up with his recipient. Such abbreviated messages may also lead to more back and forth emailing to clarify, which may not be necessary it either of them had picked up the phone or it Michael had waited till he could give the message a more considered response.

Bottom line

If you must send an email from you handheld device, take time to give an appropriate and clear response that doesn’t ruin the personal rapport between you and the recipient.