Email: such a common tool, so often misused.
This is a real email we received (with a few details changed to protect the sender’s dignity):
Full of undefined acronyms, inappropriate abbreviations, and unnecessary personal details, this email does not give me much reason to trust this company. The writer says, “If there’s anything not clear, pls feel free to contact me.” I’m not sure if I want to.
I can tell that this email came from a non-native English speaker, but I don’t think this is an acceptable excuse. I believe that anyone with a basic command of English can learn to write effective emails, with just a bit of training.
A few weeks ago Drew and I delivered a lunchtime training on Effective Email Writing to about twenty employees of a leading law firm. Our presentation followed this outline: 
I personally think the most important part of an email is the subject line. I used to work for a company that did email marketing for non-profit organizations, and we obsessed over subject lines. Email marketing, of course, generates more statistics than typical emails between colleagues or clients, but I think it’s lessons are still valid: your subject line should describe the content of your email in a specific, concise way.
Here are some good subject lines:
- Staff Meeting: Thursday 2pm
- English Classes for Customer Service Team
- YSYC termination of contract with EasySoft
- Nice meeting you at dinner Tuesday
I try hard to follow these rules myself, but sending a quick email is so easy that sometimes I get careless. About a month ago, I invited a good friend of mine to dinner on Wednesday, and she suggested we attend an event on Tuesday instead. I sent my RSVP to the event’s organizer, not realizing that the subject line said “Dinner Wednesday?” I had inadvertently invited a 60-something man I’d never met to dinner! I sent him a quick follow-up to clarify, and, no, he didn’t think I was asking him out. But still, I think this illustrates my point well.
The hilarious Dave Barry relates the hypothetical historical consequences of this hastiness in his funny review of Send: The Essential Guide to Email for Home and Office:
Imagine, for example, how useful it would have been for Paul Revere. … Since Revere was typing with his thumbs, his e-mail probably would have said something like, “teh nritish are cming.” As a result the recipients might not have grasped the urgency of the message. The Concord patriots might have assumed it was mainly intended for the Lexington patriots, while Lexington might have assumed Concord was going to handle it, and we would still be British subjects today. I’m not saying that would be a bad thing; I’m just saying it was not what Revere meant to accomplish. [more]
What email writing tips would you add? What’s the most hilarious email you’ve received in a business setting?
-Leslie
On Brazen Careerist, I’ve read a series of fascinating posts on how cultural stereotypes can be assets, by Valentina Thörner da Cruz, a German woman living in Barcelona. In this post she explains how her typically German emphasis on structure helps her at work. I think this is excellent advice for anyone writing for business, especially in a foreign language.
(1.) Worry about the content, not the language. Writing a well structured and easily understandable paper is not the same as “writing beautiful”. If I were to worry too much about the beauty of my language I would never get everything done. And here is the thing: I am not a copywriter. I do not write for marketing purposes. I write to explain things. To make complicated relations clear to people from outside (the company, the project, the team). If these things are to be published they need to go through the hands of a native-speaking copywriter anyway (as I usually write in foreign languages). So get rid of the idea to write everything in perfect style. The understandibility is the important thing (and yes, you may create new words if necessary).
…
(5) The first proofreader should be somebody who doesn’t know the project. This will give you relevant feedback on whether your style is easy enough for new people to understand it. Don’t underestimate the impact of your own implicit knowledge which you cannot expect everybody to have. [more]
In my experience, China’s educational system also values structure, but it’s more top-down-listen-to-the-teacher structure than let-me-figure-out-how-best-to-express-my-ideas structure. I look forward to sharing this advice with my students.
I can definitely identify with her idea of cultural stereotypes as assets. I’m American. Some of the positive stereotypes ascribed to my nationality: friendly to strangers, wealthy, sporty, etc. I think my friendliness has been an asset in the workplace, both at home and here in China. There are also plenty of negative ones: oblivious to the rest of the world, bad at learning foreign languages, etc. I find myself consciously challenging these stereotypes by reading a lot and speaking Chinese and Spanish as much as possible (though ideally not in the same conversation.)
What stereotypes are ascribed to you, based on your nationality, and how have they affected your professional communications?
-Leslie
I just had a fascinating conversation with one of my students, an attorney at a leading intellectual property law firm. We read “Fright Bulb: How to Crush Your Last Shard of Creativity,” the editor’s letter from the December 2009 issue of Psychology Today. [The article doesn't appear to be online. I teach him and his colleagues advanced, industry-specific, one-on-one English lessons.]
This note from editor Kaja Perina (yes, that’s her picture, from Psychology Today) begins:
For some people, there is no greater buzzkill than the chirpy imperative, “Be creative!” These words are especially irksome when accompanied by the clicking of a stopwatch or the knowledge that the speaker himself cannot solve the problem in question. The idea of creativity on demand can intimidate — or at least irritate — an otherwise innovative brain.
My student found this paragraph tricky for several reasons. He first noticed the unfamiliar colloquiallisms in the first few lines: “buzzkill,” “chirpy,” “irksome.” Once we tackled this vocabulary, the underlying sentiment surprised him more.
He kept saying, “I’m not creative.” In his work, it is rare for anyone to make “Be creative” a chirpy imperative. Legal work depends on both established procedures and clients’ expectations, and it would be quite odd for a manager to insist on explicitly creative output.
Also, he mentioned that a Chinese manager would lose face if he admitted that he “himself cannot solve the problem in question.” In the rare circumstance that he would communicate such a thing, he would do so in a roundabout way that would both maintain his dignity and imply the desire for assistance.
Read More
Yaxley Education’s Drew Ross wrote this article for China Success Stories, where it was published on November 13, 2008. The original post attracted many comments, which I invite you to check out.
One of the greatest frustrations for many foreigners when they begin working in China is the inability for many people to say one simple word: no. Saying the ‘n’ word sounds easy, but it is actually, for the vast majority of us, incredibly difficult. Whether one does not have the ability to do something or does not have the time, learning how to politely refuse a task is an essential tool that can both improve productivity and maximise time.
Teaching your staff and the people around you to say ‘no’ can be hard – especially when we are, after all, in China and saying ‘no’ can sometimes be regarded as impolite in Chinese culture. How can one balance these cultural sensitivities with the need for direct and honest answers?