Wouldn’t it be great if we could keep that high energy level consistent, all day? Great - yes, realistic - unfortunately not.

The reality is that our bodies work in cycles. Studies have verified that our bodies work in biochemical, physiological and behavioral cycles. This observation has even been given a name - Circadian Rhythm. “Circadia” literally translated from Latin means “around the day.”

So, if our bodies do work in cycles, how can we make the best of those cycles, rather than ignore or fight them? The challenge is to harness those windows of time to do and be our best.

This is where self knowledge becomes our greatest ally. The key to managing ourselves, our work and our lives is to truly know ourselves, our styles, what works for us, our strengths, and yes, our work cycles.

That’s why we should group our email sorting and handling, rather than handle it all throughout the day.

I’ve seen too many great workers use their most creative and energetic times in the day to sort benign email. What a waste!

Choose the times when you most productively handle and sort your inbox, and make appointments with yourself to do it at those times.

And don’t forget that we’ve been harping on you to not only group your email handling, but to choose a max of 5 times daily to go into that inbox! If you can marry that practice with the “right” times of day, you’ve got it made!

Let’s remember that the basis of all etiquette is RESPECT - not just politeness, but consideration for people’s time and energy and emotions.

When in doubt, ask yourself, “am I being as respectful of the recipient’s) as I can be?”

That’s the key question. That’s the one Emily would have asked you.

http://www.thetakeaway.org/stories/2009/nov/04/web-special-congress-rudeness-bipartisan/

http://www.basexblog.com/2009/07/16/in-the-briefing-room-xobni-plus/

Did you notice what XOBNI spells backwards?

1. Be concise. ‘Nuff said.
2. Get to the point. Place your main point, request, or question in the very first sentence of your message.
3. Spell check. Proofread. Make sense.
4. Use proper layout.
5. Use a readable font in a size that is easy to see.
6. Avoid stationery that takes a large amount of megabytes
7. Use the person’s name, either in the greeting, or in the body of the message.
8. Keep language gender neutral.
9. Avoid text lingo (oops, I mean language.)
10. Use only abbreviations that are well known.
11. Avoid emoticons and smiley faces.
12. Avoid long sentences.
13. Use active vs. passive voice.
14. Answer all questions, and anticipate future questions.
15. Include the important points of the message thread.
16. Clean up forwarded emails. Either delete unnecessary verbiage or highlight the important points.
17. Use detailed subject lines to help your recipient quickly understand the focus of your message.
18. For very short messages, use the subject line as the message, ending in EOM (End Of Message) to let them know not to open the message.
19. Avoid writing in ALL CAPS. It is viewed as “shouting.”
20. Use the high priority option only when it is truly high priority.
21. Use the words “URGENT” and “IMPORTANT” sparingly, and only when it is true.
22. Use ‘Reply all’ only when every person in the distribution really needs to receive the message.
23. Avoid sending email messages when you are emotional. Regardless of how you try to mask it, people will “feel it.”
24. Never forward messages that are off color, offensive, racist, or obscene.
25. Don’t forward chain emails, or emails threatening you if you “don’t forward in 24 hours.”
26. Copy ONLY the persons who really need to receive the email.
27. Avoid using email to provide “constructive criticism.” It is never taken positively. Those conversations should be done in person.
28. Avoid using BCC to rat out your co-workers. It turns YOU into the rat.
29. Avoid using email to “discuss” issues among several people - the threads become diffused, and the content is difficult to follow. Call a meeting instead.
30. Avoid sending urgent emails. If you need a response in under 3 hours, visit or call.

Many employees make the mistake of using their business email for personal reasons. Whether it’s emailing the babysitter to check on the kids or keeping up with college buddies, personal emails are scarcely warranted from your workplace email account.

Penelope’s Antidote:  Don’t do it.

A word to the wise: your employer owns your work email account, and has a legal right to every piece of information transmitted over its business network.  Even if deleted, sent emails can be “mined.” In addition, remember that emails can constitute a public record; this is yet another reason not to use them to transmit sensitive, argumentative, or personal information from your work account. Even merely accessing your personal email through your business’s internet system can be dangerous, as records and logs of those transactions can be accessed by the company.

Excerpted from Inbox Detox, Acanthus Publishing, 2009

1.  Waste peoples’ time.  The more you annoy people by creating extra work through a myriad of bonehead maneuvers like sending unnecessary emails, forgetting attachments, and inserting HUGE graphics, the less they will think of your business communications skills.

2.  Send poorly written emails.  Use improper grammar, spelling and punctuation.  Use run on sentences. 

3.  Make sure you don’t use spell check.

4.  Bury the point of your communication in the middle of the message.  By making it very hard for people to know what it is you are trying to convey, you will be sure to make a name for yourself in business circles.

5.  Forward lengthy chain emails, saying “see below.”  A great way to call attention to your lack of respect for the receiver is to forward an email that has at least 10 previously forwarded emails contained in it.  This forces the recipient to have to read through all 10 to try to figure out what is important.

6.  Copy as many people as you can.  This one is more subtle.  By adding many extra recipients, you might think you’re communicating, but what you’re really doing is adding more work to peoples’ already full plates.  They may not catch on to this one right away, but over time, you won’t be able to hide.

7.  Gossip via email.  Even though you think that your friend won’t rat you out over the gossip you sent - hey, it is a permanent record, and that “friend” could be as catty as you!

8.  Put  several names in the “To:” line

9.  Write long and rambling emails.

10. Send emails between 1am and 5am.

Here’s my response - post what you think, or go to LI and get in on the discussion.

=====

Hi Jacob,
First, the worst subject line is NO subject. It is actually kinda rude to NOT write a subject - makes the reader do even more work. Also, many spam filters filter (no subject) out, so your chances of your message getting through are reduced.

The next worst is a very general subject line, such as “Meeting” or “Girl Scouts.” What about ‘Meeting’ or ‘Girl Scouts?’ With people receiving an average of 80-160 emails daily, we need to help others triage their work.

I think some of the best subject lines are those that are very specific. e.g. “Please bring the attachment to our 2:00 Tues Staff Meeting” rather than “meeting.”

And the very best is when your message is short enough to BE the subject line, do it, and follow it with “eom” which means End of Message. Example: “Our Tuesday staff meeting has been moved from Room A to Room B. eom” Then the reader “gets” the message, and even knows he or she doesn’t hafta open it! How cool is that?

Happy emailing! Marsha http://InboxDetox.com

E-MAIL: REPORTS OF MY DEMISE ARE PREMATURE

It is both premature and foolhardy to proclaim that e-mail’s reign as “king of communications” is over as a recent Wall Street Journal article trumpets.

Not that e-mail is the best communications medium for everything; indeed we know very well it isn’t.

Instead, e-mail has, in the past 15 years in particular, become that path of least resistance for almost everything that transpires within an organization.

Update status? Send an e-mail to a few hundred of one’s closest colleagues.

Finish a report? Send another e-mail to a few hundred of one’s closest colleagues.

The fact is that we use e-mail opportunistically rather than with an understanding as to what the impact of its use might be.

Sending that status report to those few hundred colleagues actually cost the organization ca. 24 hours in lost time when one calculates the few minutes each person spent opening the e-mail he didn’t need to receive in the first place - plus the “recovery time,” which is the time it takes to get back to where one was in the task that was interrupted.

The result of all of our communications (and it isn’t just e-mail) is Information Overload, a problem that costs the U.S. economy ca. $900 billion per annum. On August 12, Information Overload Awareness Day was observed around the world with meetings and discussions (see http://www.basexblog.com/2009/07/09/information-overload-awareness-day/).
But that’s just one day - each additional day that we don’t address the problem of Information Overload and take steps to lessen its impact costs billions.

Companies can take steps to lower their exposure to Information Overload (an article about what can be done may be found at
http://www.basexblog.com/2009/04/23/lowering-your-information-overload-exposure/)
but even raising awareness of the problem and understanding the impact of overusing such tools as e-mail can make a big difference.

This Analyst Opinion is also available online at http://www.basexblog.com/2009/10/15/e-mail-reports-of-my-demise-are-premature/

Jonathan B. Spira is CEO and Chief Analyst at Basex. He can be reached at jspira@basex.com

Email was never intended to be an urgent communication tool, so take the pressure off.

The strong majority of emailers, according to studies, don’t expect a response for 24 to 48 hours. Just think of this… When YOU send an email message, you have no idea whether the recipient is at his or her computer, you don’t even know whether he or she is in the office that day! My guess is that you are in that majority who’s not expecting an immediate return.

So why then, do you put unnecessary pressure on yourself to respond immediately?

Instead, group the sorting and managing of your email. See our posts Do You “Do Email”  and Trouble Managing Your E-Mail? Behave Like an E-mergency Room Nurse for more information on how to do this.