The shock of returning to my inbox this Sunday was exacerbated by the fact that many of the e-mails I recieved were careless, pointless, or simply unnecessary. I am sure that I share this experience with many of you—sifting through the hundreds of e-mails received over a five-day span of inattention. Now, while I am very thankful for all that allows me to wield the technological power of e-mail, I take this time now to reinforce the importance of composing appropriate e-mails.
Here at RPI, e-mail has become a vehicle for such frivolous communication that I have found myself accidentally deleting messages that actually held important information in my haste to get through the onslaught. To remedy this, I propose that we all—myself included—take a moment to think about a few things the next time we sit down to send out a quick message.
1) Why am I sending this e-mail—is there a more appropriate mode of response?
2) Who should be reading it—are they (and only they) in the TO: box?
3) What exactly needs to be said in the e-mail—is it all included?
4) Is the message too long—is there extraneous information?
E-mail has become a mode of quick and efficient communication, but unfortunately, we are beginning to lose that efficiency. All too often, I find an e-mail that has potential importance, but I dismiss it due to the fact that I cannot effectively extract the information I need. This is an issue that we as RPI students (and future leaders in the workforce) need to address now before we make fools of ourselves in the real world. Take a few extra seconds or even a whole minute to make your e-mails worth reading. Help to eliminate the clutter of our inboxes, and be effective through all modes of communication.
I think that in general, the most hated e-mail that can be sent is what I like to call “the shotgun e-mail.” We’ve all received one at some point or another. It’s not exactly spam, because at least one of its recipients should be receiving it. On the other hand, it’s not a legitimate e-mail because the rest of its recipients don’t give a hoot about its topic. The members of Residence Life, the Student Senate, and the Executive Board (to name a few organizations) have recently been bombarded by shotgun e-mails from a few particular individuals. The people sending the e-mails certainly accomplished nothing other than losing the respect of their peers (to whom they sent these e-mails). So just be careful about what you write in an e-mail, and who you write it to. Including even one extra person can move the e-mail from effective to ineffective.
We are human; we have an extensive vocabulary, and we dominate the Earth because we can combine our efforts in creative ways. So go be creative and pay attention to how you present your thoughts because it is more important than you think.
