The Art of Emailing. Do's And Don'ts

Few years back, one of my colleagues was boasting that he gets 250+ mails a day at work, hinting about his rising importance in the company & with clients. I looked at him & asked ‘How do you want to solve this issue?’ He was surprised by my question. I told him, getting more mails isn’t a sign of more productivity or influence. In fact, if you are getting over 60-80 mails/day, it means you need to consciously fix the issue. There is a problem somewhere.  

In 2015, an average worker got 122 mails/day. It’s set to increase to 140/day by 2018! Now, this means you need to probably spend all day just to read/respond to mails! Who will do the actual work? 

You need to understand why are you getting so many mails? Is it because you have too many reportees, handling many clients, or trying to spread yourself thin by doing too many things. All these could make you unproductive.  

Next, stop emailing people when you can talk to them. Essay length mails are a strict no. Emails are notorious to trigger conflicts at work. Worse, you have to send more mails justifying what you meant in your 1st mail. The age-old F2F/video meetings are the best. 

Bottomline - Emails can kill your productive time. Don’t mail unless it’s necessary & don’t forget to mail when it’s necessary. Emailing is an art that you need to master. They make or break your career.

PS: Share your thoughts and experiences.