English 420Y - Business Writing Online

Thanks in advance for some feedback!

I haven’t really had a whole lot of experience with sending out formal emails. While I do work at a place that uses email frequently to communicate with the home office, I rarely do the emailing myself. I do, however, use email to communicate with members of my sorority. With close to one hundred girls in the house, email is a very important communication tool, as well as, the most effective. I’ve learned that the tone of an email makes the difference on how the reader reacts.

Chapter 27 was very interesting; I send all kinds of emails on a daily basis. There was a lot of information that was covered in chapter 27 that I had never learned about or thought about before. I send emails to friends and family very often but I also send emails at my internship everyday. Actually when I got into work today my inbox had about fifteen emails that I had to respond to.

In response to the article about the CEO who sent out an "angry" email to all of his employees accusing them of not working to their full potential, I felt that this was a ludicrous method in trying to motivate his workers. First off, why would a man of his power send out an email of that nature to everyone in the company?

I honestly didnt know that there were so many rules and etiquette (netiquette) about sending emails. But after doing the reading, I can defintely see how people may break some of the standards by accident. I know I like emails that are straight and to the point. And it does bother me when people take ridiculous amounts of time to respond to my emails. Also, since most of the time I use my home (parent's) computer, large attachments or pictures are just annoying.

In the resume readings I thought it was interesting how often it was noted that employers do not spend hardly any time at all going over resumes. The times that they said were just around thirty seconds. This does not seem like a lot of time for an employer to evaluate someone, so it just shows how important it is to do a good job on your resume. You must make sure that you get to the point and also use keywords that they will be looking for. It is also important to make sure that it is presentable and looks well developed.

Emailing has certainly become one of the largest means of communication in my life, both personal and professional. The reading from the text was extremely helpful to me. Most importantly the sections about the subject line, the greeting, and the signature. The hardest parts of an email for me have always been the subject and the greeting. Usually my subjects end up too vague and I never know how formal to make my greeting, although I usually play it safe and go more conservative rather than less. So I was relieved when I read that is the proper thing to do.

I think the CEO had good intentions but a very poor choice of delivery. E-mail is best used to share information and facts very quickly among one and other in a work place. It is not the best place to try to correct what you feel is a growing problem in your company. It is especially not a good idea to use such a harsh tone in your e-mal for many reasons. One as the CEO found out is that it leaves a firm trail that can be traced back to you. Another reason is that it is very hard to judge a persons tone and demeanor from an e-mail message.

Just a few weeks ago at my internship, a friend that works at the bank told me a funny story about accidentally sending an email. Sometimes during the week my friend and his coworkers joke around sending emails mocking everybody at work to make the day go faster. It kind of has turned into a routine, everybody at work always gets a laugh. My friend, called Luis, has this other friend called Lalo, which is also part of the funny emails. It turns out that Luis sent out a message to Lalo (with everybody else included in the email) just saying: Lalo is a homosexual.

My favorite of the Ten Habits of Successful Emailers is number 3, "Take some time to edit and revise your message before sending it". I rarely remember to do this and it can and probably will cause some negative results if I don't start revising my emails before I send them. I don't know if anyone else thinks like this but I feel since I'm just emailing a professor and not talking to them face to face I don't have to write in a certain manner.