Do
• Develop clear guidelines for the organisation
• Set up central intranet folders for non-critical social/personal e-mails
• Set up filters and folders to group e-mail by subject and priority
• Use notes and acronyms to indicate how critical an e-mail is
• Use a salutation and sign-off
• Put a clear message in the subject field – even avoiding body text if possible
Don’t
• Send an e-mail if you wouldn’t bother saying the same thing on the phone
• Copy people into e-mails unnecessarily
• Forward e-mails that still contain old, irrelevant messages
• Forward attachments where an html link can be used instead
• Reply to an entire group if you only intend it for one person
• Use capital letters unless you’re intending to convey a “shout”
• Allow your inbox to become more than one screen-full
• Send an angry e-mail
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