A client asked me recently: “What is the most important aspect of improving email use?”

There are many different aspects to improving email effectiveness – a crucial one is knowing how to write business emails that achieve the results that you want every single time.

Ten years ago only a few members of staff were responsible for writing business letters. However these days everyone within an organisation is expected to be fluent in effective business email writing.

 Yet companies often do not teach their staff how to write effective business emails.

 So here are few tips:

1. Keep every business email short and to the point.

2. Avoid any words or language that will distract the reader from the message you want to convey.

3. Read back to yourself – make sure it flows beautifully. You want the reader to get your message and nothing else.

During Emailogic seminars we teach users all the aspects of improving email effectiveness – of course.

The longest ever tennis match took place last week at Wimbledon and lasted an incredible 9 hours. Both players were exhausted and the match was played out over 3 days before a satisfactory result was achieved.

Do you ever feel like you are playing a game of tennis with your email inbox? Have you ever had an email trail that goes back for days? Do you feel exhausted just by contemplating the amount of unread messages you can see in your inbox? And sometimes it doesn’t matter how many times you reply – the email (like the ball) – just keeps coming back.

Sadly hundreds of thousands of British workers feel the same way and email overload robs companies of hundreds of thousands of man hours each year.

Like a Wimbledon champion needs a good trainer, email users need a good training course to show them how to send the right message to the right person in the right way. Think of it like practicing your backhand. Once you have mastered it you can take control of the points, win the set and eventually the match!

That’s why hundreds of organisations have called in the email training masters – Emailogic – and we have created email champions to rival Federer and Nadal.

Email overload is kind of antique.

Did you know that the first postcard was sent in England in 1871 – but in just 1873 the British were sending 72 million of them?

So we clearly love to keep in touch with our nearest and dearest when on holiday.

Think how easy it is now to send news and pictures from abroad to friends and family.

While the benefits of emailing for pleasure and keeping in touch are fantastic – the outlook for work emails is less happy.

50% office workers say they are addicted to their email – with some owning up to checking their inboxes while on the toilet! Can you imagine being addicted to reading that postcard your Grandma sent from Cleethorpes?

And the pressures of email overload at work have 77% British workers complaining that any interruptions to their email service causes them major stress.

Not surprising – according to research by the Radicati Group, each office worker sends and receives an average of 110 emails every day and that figure looks set to rise next year.

That’s a lot of postcards!

I visited a client today to discuss email training – “Everyone took responsibility for communication where I used to work” he said.

He told me that in his previous role he was in a team of 100 and there were 2 PC’s between them.

Communication amongst the team was far better than where he is now – where everyone has 24/7 email access, mobile phones and instant messaging.

“What made the difference in the last place” I asked?

“There was ownership of outcomes, not blame. There was always someone to ask if you didn’t know. There was intent to achieve and get things done – not protect yourself and cover your back.”

A decent mantra for using email in the workplace.

Recently I visited a hospital and asked what email etiquette was like.

The reply was “never mind about email etiquette – many nurses don’t bother checking their emails as there are too many and there is no way they can deal with them – they don’t have the time!”.

I visited a college and asked what email use was like – “Grotesque” – came the answer from the Head of Communications.

Or what about the telecoms company where a senior IT manager described email use as “like rat shit”.

How would you describe email use in your organisation?

1. A manager sends a short email at 3pm with an action – she works in another office and you have never met her. Her email is written abruptly and the tone comes across as impolite and thoughtless.

2. A colleague sends you an email – he is incensed as you did not attend a meeting yesterday and the project has now been put back a week. He blames you for this using outrageous language – which surprises you as he is normally quite mild mannered.

Most of us empathise when we see someone cry, react to a bad smell or subjected to a physical assault. I saw this whilst watching my son play rugby recently – thankfully he was not the one who punched. Our brains tend to empathise when we see a painful reaction.

When we send an email we do not see the reaction we elicit from the recipient when the message is read. Therefore we are less likely to empathise when writing emails and this leads to scenarios like those above – and far worse.

The psychological term for this is dishinibition. The definition is as follows: “Disinhibition“ – a term in psychology used to describe a lack of restraint manifested in several ways, including disregard for social conventions, impulsivity, and poor risk assessment.

Sometimes we display these characteristics in our use of email at work – without thinking.

Can you relate to this when thinking about certain emails you have received?

Or sent?

Recent surveys show:

39% of UK employees claim their stress levels are higher now than a year ago – according to Investors in People

38% of delegates who attend Emailogic training report feeling less stressed as a result – according to Emailogic.

Emailogic are offering a special seminar package during Adult Learners’ Week – find out more.

I have had many wonderful teachers over the years.

One of them once said that it is impossible for human beings to communicate clearly face to face so they are TRULY and COMPLETELY understood.

When we put wires inbetween people and restrict them to using just words and then make the communication asynchronous (one way), it becomes even more difficult.

Put them in an organisation with 500+ other people and give them all the facility to communicate together (with no training) – you then have a very complex situation.

The chances of communicating clearly
- 100% of the time is zero.
- the majority of the time is also zero.
- some of the time is reasonable at best.

In business over 60% of all communication happens over email – and only some of these communications are being received loud and clear.

Can we really afford to leave it as it is?

We need more email superheroes!

“We are focusing on working smarter not harder”.

In this economic environment companies everywhere are trying to do more for less, become leaner, work more efficiently, work smarter not harder and increase productivity.

Time can easily be freed up by using email more productively – that time saved can then be used to focus on increasing revenue or providing more service to communities or maybe giving staff more face to face management time.

An example….

I received a great email the other day. It was addressed to 18 managers. There was a summary at the top that indicated why it was being sent to each person. There were a couple of notes to individuals where there was an action – one was to me. The notes indicated what we needed to do – others were asked for opinions and some were sent it just for information.

It was an important message and relevant to all. We were all able to deal with it easily.

I appreciated the fact that the sender had really taken my needs into consideration and done a little work at their end – rather than just dumping the email on me and everyone else. We had all saved time.

Smart and not hard.