\nIcons

Throughout the anti-pattern collection presented in this book you will find the following icons. We choose them to structure the pattern description and highlight its most important elements.

",{"_151":152,"_43":44,"_47":48,"_45":46,"_65":66,"_153":154,"_169":149},"previewContent","

\n Just send an email\n
\n Introduction\n
\n Anti-Patterns for email-centric organizations\n
- \n How do you know you are in an email-centric organization?\n
\n
\n Icons\n
\n Dear Tpyo\n
\n Re:gret\n
\n Email Anti-Patterns Summaries\n
\n Conclusions\n
- \n Do I really need to send an email?\n
- \n @JustSendAnEmail\n
\n
\n References\n
- \n Email\n
- \n Anti-Patterns\n
\n

\nJust send an email

\n\n

\n
Email is the worst form of communication on the internet, except for all of the other forms of communication on the internet.
\n

\n\n

\n
(Dan Cohen, @dancohen 12 May 2016)
\n

\n\n

\nIntroduction

\n\n

It’s 2070, yet another attempt to replace email messaging has fizzled. You are stuck with an overflowing inbox and wonder why to get anything done you have to “just send me an email about it”. Email to ask for permission, email to inform everyone about new regulations, email that lose elections, endless email conversations to settle on a place and time for very important meetings. Critical data files buried within compressed email attachments that get lost right before you need to take a look at them. Even email you have to send to yourself for making the big television screen show those nice pictures taken with your phone.

\n\n

Even if today there is probably no better solution to a-synchronous inter-personal communication than email, there are many ways to use it. In this book we have collected many, I am afraid too many, examples of incorrect, inefficient or simply strange or funny ways of using email communication between human people who are supposed to work together in large and small organizations. Despite the age of the medium (the first electronic mail ‘msg’ over the Interwebs was ‘snt’ in late 1971), these anti-patterns are still abundant across what we call email-centric organizations.

\n\n

We sincerely wish that you will not recognize many of the email anti-patterns documented in this book, but in case you do – there is hope. By giving a name to the problem, you start realizing a solution should and can be found. To do so, you can take advantage of the experience distilled in these pages and read the suggestions that accompany each anti-pattern.

\n\n

In case your organization has already graduated to a data-centric or process-centric maturity level, congratulations! Still, be aware that the risk of taking the shortcut: “just send it by email” is always lurking somewhere near.

\n\n\n

\nAnti-Patterns for email-centric organizations

\n\n

\n
Just send an email: it’s the way we do it here.
\n

\n\n

Anti-patterns are bad practices that despite their negative consequences continue to be applied due to their low cost, ease of use and apparent good fit to solve pressing problems. It is possible to outgrow them by learning that a better (more effective and with less unintended negative consequences) solution exists.

\n\n

In this book you will find the anti-patterns we have uncovered so far by observing how people communicate within email-centric organizations. Email-centric organizations are those organization where the main — or in the extreme case, the only — form of internal communication relies on email exchange. Email are the only available mechanisms for information dissemination and sharing, for discussion and decision making, for systems and application integration, for getting stuff published on the Web, and also for running and managing critical business tasks and processes.

\n\n

What would happen if next time you log in, you find out all your email is gone? Email-centric organizations are those which cannot survive after their email server crashes.

\n\n

Since email is so important, doing it wrong can become a critical productivity killer, an incredible communication bottleneck, and a wasteful distraction for the collective attention span of your organization. Especially when the anti-patterns we feature in the current version of this book are involved:

\n\n

More anti-patterns are currently being considered for addition:

\n\n

Black Hole
Broadcast Unsubscribe
Chattymails
Cry Wolf!!
Friday Evening Mail
Mail from the Grave
Pre-escalated Reminder
Private Side-Mail
Redundant Mail-Call-Meet
Social Spam
Empty Reply
Faked Reply
FAQ Auto-reply
Total Recall
Two-step Mail Merge
Unwanted Newsletter
Neverending Story

\n\n\n

Let us know if you recognize some of the anti-patterns and would like to share how they affect your organization and you attempt to deal with them. There are probably many more that we are missing, so do not hesitate to drop us a line if you would like to suggest some other ones.

\n\n\n

\nHow do you know you are in an email-centric organization?

\n\n

To find out, please answer the following questions:

\n\n

To apply for a position, did you have to send them your CV by email?
Do you schedule interview slots by sending an email to everyone asking them about their availability?
Did you get your job offer by opening an email attachment?
Your first day, did you get a new email account as you walked in the office?
Do they usually send out a company-wide email to welcome newcomers?
Did they deliver your fresh copy of the employee handbook via email?
How often people reply to all on your department/company-wide mailing list?
To go out for lunch, do you invite your colleagues by email?
Do you need to send an email to reserve a meeting room?
Are meeting agendas discussed and agreed-upon over email?
Do people frantically go through their inboxes during meetings to lookup information?
Are meeting minutes shared and approved via email?
When a new team or department is created, does it get its own institutional contact email address?
Are random news and company-wide decisions broadcast by the boss to everyone at random times?
To buy something, do you have to send someone an email with the shopping list?
To get a virtual machine up and running, do you have to send the specs by email?
To update something published on a website, do you have to send an email with the corrections?
When they relaunch their corporate website, do they suggest you should send them an email to ask for directions if you get lost in the redesign?
To print something, do you have to first send it via email for approval?
To print something, after it’s been approved, do you have to send it via email to the print bureau?
Do you submit travel authorization requests by email?
Do you keep your flight tickets and hotel reservations in your inbox?
Do you have to send your presentation slides by email so that they can be displayed on the conference room beamer?
Do you approve expense reports by replying to an email?
To get fired, do people get the pink slip via email?

\n\n

If you notice yourself nodding in agreement while answering most of these questions, chances are that you find yourself in a place where email is the main or even the only communication channel.

\n\n

While of course email is a powerful, cheap and fast communication tool both within and across organizations, most of the previous cases (e.g., booking a room!) are an actual real-life example of what in this book we call “email anti-pattern”.

\n\n

Keep reading to find out how to do better.

\n\n\n

\nIcons

\n\n

Throughout the anti-pattern collection presented in this book you will find the following icons. We choose them to structure the pattern description and highlight its most important elements.

\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

\nDear Tpyo

\n\n\n\n

What’s the worst possible offense you can do to an academic?

\n\n

Misspell his or her name, of course.

\n\n\n\n\n

In academia, next to the institutional reputation, one’s name is like a personal brand in which people invest during an entire career.

\n\n

Please learn how to spell it correctly, if you would like to get an answer to your email.

\n\n

Also if you are not an academic, I am sure you will enjoy to begin reading a fresh new email not addressed to a typo. Whether it’s intentional or not, the sheer level of disrespect to misspell someone’s name is hard to fathom. Especially in a professional email reply when the correct spelling was right there in the business signature of the original message.

\n\n

Also Bryan (Brian), Candice (Candace), Lara (Laura), Laura (Lauren), Theresa (Teresa), Sara (Sarah), Darcy (Darcie), Christy (Christie/Kirsty/Kirstie), Vanessa (Venessa), Kelly (Kelley), and Louise will be grateful if you spell their name right.

\n\n

If you choose to invest into a personalized greeting (Hi Leslie!) replying to an email from Liselle (clearly spelled out in her email address, salutation and signature), you might as well radically simplify your opening with a plain and friendly Hi!

\n\n

When in doubt, here is a useful trick which requires little effort to master.

\n\n\n\n

If only my email client was smart enough to start writing that address line by itself!

\n\n\n

\nRe:gret

\n\n\n\n

This is more than a simple case of procrastination, you truly wish you had – right now – the time to give the email your full attention, properly draft a response, revise it, and send an answer that makes a good impression.

\n\n

Your regret grows as the email lingers in your inbox, apparently yet another unanswered message, but in reality something you wish you could have taken care of yesterday.

\n\n

Precrastination would also not help in this case: answering the email will require to dedicate significant time and effort to get it done. This is not something you can do while checking your inbox right before boarding your flight. And if you’d send a half-backed answer mistyped on a phone chances are you will regret it later.

\n\n

As your email debt grows, you will keep postponing sending your answer because of the growing embarassment between not wanting to send a quick acknowledgement (that would be too late) and not yet having done it (you have started several attempts but you are a perfectionist).

\n\n\n\n

You cheat yourself into responding by flagging the email as unread.
You get a (friendly and timely, but still dreaded) reminder, which triggers a cascade of events that make you unable to keep deferring your answer (which you suspect may not be liked when they read it).
You realize that the email was sent to a mailing list and everyone but you already answered it.
If it’s that important, tell everyone to hold on while you work on it. Giving a timeframe for your reply may help, if you expect it will be a while.
In the worst case, you wait until April 30th. Why? It’s the email forgiveness day, when you can reply to your re:grets without too much shame.

\n\n\n\n

\nEmail Anti-Patterns Summaries

\n\n

Unsecured Sensitive Mail

\n\n

Whatever you send by email, unencrypted, is available for anyone to read.

\n\n

Monday Morning Mail

\n\n

How do you catch the attention of the busy professional with an overflowing inbox?

\n\n

5pm Reply

\n\n

A polite clarification question (what did you mean?) always at the end of the business day (the next email will need to wait until tomorrow).

\n\n

Happy Holidays

\n\n

Send your seasons greetings on a real card next time!

\n\n

Redirect

\n\n

You send an email politely asking for something and the reply politely informs you to go send your request to someone else.

\n\n

Ticketless Support

\n\n

Any trouble? just send an email and. someone. will. help.

\n\n

Room.Booking.Mail

\n\n

Could you please book the meeting room for tomorrow?

\n\n

FAQ Autoreply

\n\n

When you send a very specific question and they immediately respond with a generic FAQ answer like they didn’t even bother to read your email.

\n\n

Apply by Mail

\n\n

Please kindly submit your application to this email address.

\n\n

Process Patch

\n\n

Exploit email to exchange at any time whatever information is not explicitly foreseen by the process you are supposed to follow.

\n\n

On Behalf

\n\n

How to make it difficult for everyone that receives your email to answer you directly by replying to the email?

\n\n

To for Two

\n\n

When you send 1 email to 2 (or N) people, nobody feels in charge and you get 0 answers.

\n\n

Attached Body

\n\n

An empty email with an attachment containing the actual message.

\n\n

Datamail

\n\n

Email used for asking a person to read or write data into files, databases, or information systems.

\n\n

Dear Tpyo

\n\n

People misspelling my name when replying to an email my name is in, irks my soul.

\n\n

Lightning Reply

\n\n

Lightning replies reach your inbox while your email client is still working on sending out the original message.

\n\n

Useless Acknowledgement (Uck)

\n\n

Acknowledgements carrying zero information. Did they actually read my mail?

\n\n

Unnecessary informal request for validation. Do they really think I wouldn’t understand this?

\n\n

Re:gret

\n\n

The email you put off responding to since you want to give it your full attention - and thus never answer, giving the sender the impression you don’t care, when in fact it’s the most important thing in your inbox.

\n\n

Untimely Reminder

\n\n

Broadcasting reminders via email addressed to an entire organization five minutes before the event can be a symptom of desperation.

\n\n

Fw’d:CC’d

\n\n

When someone forwards me an email I was already carbon-copied on.

\n\n

Eager Undetected Reply

\n\n

When sending out email requests to do something with a long due date, do not confuse acknowledgements (which tend to arrive quickly) with the actual task results (which normally arrive around the time you expect them, but could show up earlier than you think).

\n\n

Unintended Reply-To-All

\n\n

Replying to all recipients with the intention of privately replying to the original sender only. Never happens.

\n\n

Unfinished Reply

\n\n

If you ask n questions in an email, at most n-1 will be answered.

\n\n

Fuzzy Link

\n\n

For more information visit my homepage! (Nothing happens when you click on homepage)

\n\n

Collaborative Edit

\n\n

Can someone please send me the latest version?

\n\n

Web Master Mail

\n\n

Please post this somewhere on our website.

\n\n

Email from God

\n\n

Dear all, effective immediately…

\n\n

META SPAM

\n\n

Dear all, as you may have noticed today you are receiving some SPAM messages.

\n\n\n

\nConclusions

\n\n\n

\nDo I really need to send an email?

\n\n

If you have not learned anything else from this book, you should remember this. Next time you click on your trusty “New Message” button, think about:

\n\n

Do I really need to send an email?
Do I really need to send it right now?
Do I really need to send this mail to everyone?

\n\n

Chances are you can avoid many of the anti-patterns presented in this book if you learn when it is a really great idea to answer no to such questions.

\n\n

If you are convinced the email is ready to go, breathe and think about:

\n\n

Do I really need to squeeze so many topics into one message?
Did I forget to reply to some of the issues raised in the previous message?
Should I maybe give them a quick call to resolve the matter right away instead of hopelessly resending the message once again?

\n\n

When in doubt, save it as a draft, do not send it (yet) and revise it after a good night sleep the next morning. If you are still in doubt, ask a colleague for feedback about your message content and style, but please – don’t do it over email, get up and go talk to them.

\n\n\n

\n@JustSendAnEmail

\n\n

We hope you have enjoyed reading about email anti-patterns as much as we have writing about them in this book and that you will consider leaving a (virtual) copy on the desk of your friends and colleagues, in case you would like to drop them a hint on how to improve their email life.

\n\n

You can also send them an email with a link to the email anti-patterns website where you can find a short summary of every anti-pattern described in this book.

\n\n

\n\n\n

\nReferences

\n\n

Louis V. Gerstner, Jr.\nWho Says Elephants Can’t Dance?\nHarper Business, 2002

\n\n

\nEmail

\n\n

Ray Tomlinson, The First Network Email\n
Donald E. Knuth, Email (let’s drop the hyphen)\n
Vinton G. Cerf, When Email Isn’t Private\nCommunications of the ACM, Vol. 59 No. 12, Page 15, December 2016
Alex Goldman, email debt forgiveness day\n
Yoram M. Kalman, Gilad Ravid.\nFiling, piling, and everything in between: The dynamics of E-mail inbox management\nJournal of the Association for Information Science and Technology.
\ndoi: 10.1002/asi.23337
Farshad Kooti, Luca Maria Aiello, Mihajlo Grbovic, Kristina Lerman, and Amin Mantrach.\nEvolution of Conversations in the Age of Email Overload.\nProceedings of the 24th International Conference on World Wide Web (WWW 2015)\npages 603-613, 2015.
Mihajlo Grbovic, Guy Halawi, Zohar Karnin, Yoelle Maarek.\nHow many folders do you really need?: Classifying email into a handful of categories. \nProceedings of the 23rd ACM International Conference on Conference on Information and Knowledge Management\npages 869-878, 2014.
Stephen R. Barley, Debra E. Meyerson, Stine Grodal.\nE-mail as a Source and Symbol of Stress.\nOrganization Science,\nVolume 22, No. 4, Pages 887-906, July-August 2011
Steve Whittaker, Victoria Bellotti, Jacek Gwizdka.\nEmail in personal information management. \nCACM\nVolume 49, Number 1, Pages 68-73, January 2006.
Karen Renaud, Judith Ramsay, Mario Hair. \n“You’ve Got E-Mail!” … Shall I Deal With It Now? Electronic Mail From the Recipient’s Perspective.\nInternational Journal of Human-Computer Interaction, \nVolume 21, Issue 3, Pages 313-332, 2006
Joshua R. Tyler, John C. Tang. \nWhen Can I Expect an Email Response? A Study of Rhythms in Email Usage \nProceedings of the Eighth European Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work (ECSCW 2003)\npages 239-258, 2003.
Wendy E. Mackay.\nMore than just a communication system: Diversity in the use of electronic mail. \nACM Transactions on Office Information Systems\nVolume 6, Number 4, Pages 380-397, 1988.
Elizabeth Bernstein\nReply All: The Button Everyone Loves to Hate\nWSJ, 8 March 2011

\n\n

\nAnti-Patterns

\n\n

William J. Brown, Raphael C. Malveau, Hays W. “Skip” McCormick, Thomas J. Mowbray.\nAntiPatterns: Refactoring Software, Architectures, and Projects in Crisis. Wiley, 1998\nISBN 978-0-471-19713-3
Andrew Koenig.\nPatterns and Antipatterns. \nJournal of Object-Oriented Programming \nVolume 8, Issue 1, Pages 46-48, March-April 1995.

\n\n

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\nIcons

Table of Contents

\nJust send an email

\nIntroduction

\nAnti-Patterns for email-centric organizations

\nHow do you know you are in an email-centric organization?

\nIcons

\nDear Tpyo

\nRe:gret

\nEmail Anti-Patterns Summaries

\nConclusions

\nDo I really need to send an email?

\n@JustSendAnEmail

\nReferences

\nEmail

\nAnti-Patterns