Email is one of most important medium to communicate. We deal with numbers of emails daily. Some of them are lengthy emails which we lost in mid and have to start reading from start. Some are confusing emails where ask is not clear and you have to do multiple back and forth before replying final response. We also get offended emails where it looks like that sender is complaining about your work, After boiling your blood, later you find that it was not sender’s intention. Last but not least, we also get emails where question is asked without name and keeping tons of people in TO section. Now you need to figure it out yourself that who will respond.
Email Writing is an Art
No matter, you are writing to your best friends or management, you need to ensure that it is professional, concise, creating no confusion, polite and giving correct messages to all readers who will get this email.
Till mid stage of my developer career, I was facing this problem badly. I used to write lengthy, unstructured emails to share my analysis. My team and manager had to do multiple follow-ups or setup a meeting to understand my email. Even my solution/analysis was correct, Still it was so unstructured, long and lengthy, team was unable to understand and end up with setting a meeting with me to understand analysis.
I took this as a feedback and read lots of blogs and tutorials. I adapted many rules and gave up many as well. After continuous practice, I feel that i have good command on this art.
Following are few rules which I apply when I write email to ensure that this email will do exactly as it is intended to do.
1. Think and make a structure
Before writing email, first I take a pause and think about exact message which I want to give to readers. Then I focus to structure that message to deliver.
For an example, I found an issue and want to notify management and developers. So I will write problem statement first, then impact/risk and after that possible solutions or next steps with owners. This way once reader read problem statement and wants to read more for details, he will read next section else will move to next email.
If I am providing analysis of some problem, I provide high level of root cause, next steps and then low level of analysis details or refer Jira id for more details.
Whenever I receive any email, which does not give me clear message in first 2 -3 lines, I usually give up and mark for reply later. Ultimately your purpose to send that email is defeated.
2. Shorter but sharper
Make email shorter as much as possible but keep it sharp, clear and concise. People like to read short emails first and try to reply faster than lengthy emails. I mark long emails to read for later and usually respond them late in day or after several days once I get reminder.
While writing email, stay with the point and try to use multiple short paragraphs with correct order in place of one big paragraph. Small paragraphs and spacing between paragraphs looks good and keep email simple.
3. Formatting
Try to use bullet points to share your thoughts in place of one paragraph. People read bullet points more carefully then paragraph.
Use of bold, italic, underline and background text color should be minimal. Using too many of these items lose mail simplicity and make email complex. Always use correct font size in place of very small or big.
4. Subject
Keep your email subject short and very sharp so that it can tell clearly that what is this about without reading single line of email. It will help readers to filter email based on their interest and chances are high that people will not miss your email.
5. Proofread
This is most critical step. In this last step, wear reader’s hat and read your email to see how it will look like to others when they will get it and read it.
Is subject and email message clear enough? Is there any spelling mistake? Is email offending or hurting someone? Are right people included in To, CC and BCC?
Check about points and fix if exist and repeat step 5. Keep repeating this step, unless as a reader, you are satisfied.
In a nutshell, before writing email, Think for a moment about message and structure and then start writing. Do not worry about spelling mistakes, you will fix those in last step while reviewing. Important is structure and messaging. Polishing can be done in last.