{"id":299,"date":"2022-01-17T20:13:13","date_gmt":"2022-01-17T20:13:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.julianreed.net\/?p=299"},"modified":"2025-05-27T12:08:24","modified_gmt":"2025-05-27T12:08:24","slug":"how-to-waste-a-colleagues-time-with-email","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.julianreed.net\/?p=299","title":{"rendered":"How to waste a colleague’s time with email"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
Email is still a useful way to communicate, but it’s also one of the easiest ways to be take out a small chunk of someone’s day. Most people, including me, have at one point or another fallen into one of the traps that waste others’ time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some examples are listed below:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dear Julia, Dear Reed, Dear Julius etc.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
I\u2019m Julian and the clues are in my email address julian<\/strong>.reed@[my_employers_name].com as well as in my signature at the bottom of the email you are responding to<\/p>\n\n\n\n
FPA CARP BRD, please respond by EOD. TYVM<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sorry that I come across as someone who needs their mind sharpening. But thank you for spending part of your working day thinking up how to incorporate a little cryptic puzzle into your message for me\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n
! Urgent flags for a non-urgent message<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Your lack of preparation is not my emergency. Using the urgent flag does not mean that you jump the queue! You\u2019re going to the back of the queue!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
LOTS OF TEXT IN CAPS!<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Don\u2019t shout at me, I\u2019m sensitive! <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Or are you worried that I will not understand the most important aspects of the email because I was off that day in school when they taught how to read the alphabet in lower case?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Loosely pepper apostrophes around with wild abandon<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Example: <\/strong>These feature\u2019s are all aligned with the MVP.\u00a0\u00a0As for the main feature, it\u2019s delivery date is next week.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
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