The Art of Situational Awareness in Email

Welcome to the Quick Take podcast, the show where you get targeted advice and coaching for executives by executives. I'm Suzy Tominczuk.

And I'm James Capps. Give us 15 minutes and we'll give you three secrets to address the complex topic of issues that are challenging executives like you today.

Hey, welcome. This is Quick Take. I'm one of your hosts, Suzy Tominczuk, along with my very good friend, James Capps. How are you, James?

I'm also one of your hosts. I'm fantastic. How about?

yourself. We're co-hosts.

Co-hosts too.

So we're going to talk about situational awareness is one of my favorite things, but we're going to talk specifically about email today, and I think this is a topic that doesn't come up enough, and I'll tell you why. I have a story for you, james. Do you want to hear my story?

Oh, do tell I love your stories.

Yeah, I have a client of mine, Lynn, because we're always my Lynn right Lynn.

Oh, that's right About your child running around your house.

So Lynn and I were talking this week and she's a VP at an organization and she admitted that on a Friday afternoon she sent kind of a crappy email to somebody that she was very frustrated with, that she doesn't trust, that she doesn't like in the organization, and what happened was that email was then forwarded on to her boss that person's boss and then that email became a meeting.

Oh yeah, it's the worst.

It got bad. So email is really something that you can cover your butt on. You know, you put that out there. Sure, did you see the email? It can be passive-aggressive. And right about email in the right way. As an executive, you're teaching people, so I thought it'd be interesting. Yeah, what do you think?

That's a great topic, and I think that, as leaders and executives, we tend to be a little more polished or emotionally attuned to what's going on in a meeting, but that sometimes doesn't translate to email, and so, as we continue to leverage email and as you tend to have more critical communications with your teams, knowing how to appropriately address the situation, see how things are being talked about and just being aware of the general politics when you're communicating with email is just so important.

Yeah, so what are your best practices around email?

Yeah, I think that this is a no-brainer, although I'm surprised how often people tend to forget this is if you've gone back and forth more than three times, it's a meeting.

Absolutely.

When that conversation is clearly not getting resolved. There's more people being added, there's additional details. Maybe a corollary to that is when your email is longer than this, it's a meeting and at the end of the day, there's nothing better than just the verbal dialogue.

So know the point at which that email should go to a meeting Absolutely, and there are people that are listening to us on podcast this long is a screen.

That's right, that's right. That's how long it should be, yeah because if you're scrolling through an email A, you've already lost me, unless it's a recap of some kind. But the reality is is you probably should get everybody on the phone.

Yeah, and I love that you said three. And then it's a meeting, so as an executive, you should call it. You should say listen, this is this and help to help people understand that right.

Yeah, I think it's not only important for that situation to nip it in the bud, if you will but also to state that as a standard. Hey guys, this has gone back more times than it probably should. As a rule, let's jump to a meeting at this point, nothing else. It eliminates another 10,000 emails you're probably going to have on your inbox. But the truth is, as a leader, you can set the standard.

Okay, that's a good one. What's your second one?

No, I really think the second one that a lot of folks miss is really be aware of who's on the distribution list.

I've never hit send without rereading who's on that distril list.

And as a leader, you can show a lot of authority, thinking and intelligence by adjusting the distribution list mid thread. There is nothing more powerful than saying, hey, what you know what folks I'm just I'm decreasing this distril list to only the people that need to be involved. Or, you know, what I love to do more than anything is I remove my boss from a thread that he doesn't need to be involved in. I think one of the classiest email tricks out there is when you move somebody from the two or the CC line, move them to the BCC line and then put in the body of the email dropping you know, dropping Carl to the BCC out of respect to his inbox, because then they'll get the final email that says that they've been removed and they don't need to be there. They don't need to be there. And that shows you, shows as a leader, that you're you're controlling the narrative, you're limiting the amount of chaos that comes from that and you're and you're focusing the conversation right where you want and I love calling out the BCC.

You have to do that, Otherwise it's snarky. You know, whenever I adjust the distril list, whether add or subtract, I always put that in the body so people are fully aware. But it is leadership, it is saying, you know, it's no different than reaching out, reaching down the hall and grabbing somebody to a meeting or saying, hey, you know what folks this, you all don't need to be in this room right now. Why don't you go back to your to back to your desks or whatever? It's really about you showing the maturity and the leadership to say who needs to be part of this conversation.

Yeah, I love that so much, and it just brought me back to the days when, when this was talked about more, I remember my boss telling me that the, the copy line, the CC line, should go by hierarchy. It should go, and so it's so funny that back in years ago, when email was becoming a standard, we were really thoughtful about it, and now we've become it's like such a passive way that anything there's no rules. I feel like we've lost the rules.

I agree with you. I think it is more of a casual communication style and you can do. There's a spectrum of starting an email with a dear somebody and signing an email with front or love or sincerely. I mean that is on one side of that crazy spectrum. And then there's the other side of that spectrum which is a text message which is no vowels and just a few emojis. So you have to be aware of the medium and be aware of the context. I think that's really a great. Third point of view is no, and be aware of who you're communicating with and what style you should be using. Full senses and grammar matter in some communications, and so I think it's important that people remember that.

So what you're saying is being thoughtful about how you place your. I like to tell people to do like an executive summary with some additional information below, if it's an informational or put something, put some action or give some expectations about what you want from this.

Well, I think emails and that's just good email policy, and I think we could do a whole thing on email standards. But emails should be more like articles. You don't want to bury the lead. You get to the plate right away and then you provide the details. If you're finding that there's a long narrative and then the punchline, the readers aren't going to appreciate that. So there are a lot of rules to make sure that the emails are consumed correctly and well received. But I think, from a situational awareness, it's so important that you keep in mind how that email will be received and then where it will go after. Just like anything else on the internet, emails can live forever, and snarky comments, weird references to previous jokes, all will. It can be misconstrued, and so I think when you talk, when you really want to put an email together, you should be thoughtful about what that looks like yeah, and one thing that I think is a good practice around that is writing the email stepping away and walking back and reading it again so that you can take out those things.

It gives you the pleasure of putting them in and then you edit yourself, but like okay.

Yep, well, I find that when I write an email, a quick email, I tend not to use full sentences and I'll use just I won't use really a noun upfront, and it'll just be poorly structured sentences, and then I'll crank that out in like five seconds and then I'll go back and proofread it and I'm like well, that doesn't make any sense.

Yeah, I see that too.

I just wrote that five seconds ago and I already don't understand what I was saying, so there is a reality of all right, taking a break, go back and proofread, take it, have a sandwich, whatever it requires you, especially if you are, if there's some passion and energy going on to your earlier story, you need to be thoughtful. So I mean, maybe that's a fourth take away around. Situational awareness is bonus. Yeah, we need the bonus button there I don't have a sound effect yet but is to make sure you are aware of the situation and knowing your, you know, be aware of your emotional situation and take a break.

Awesome, awesome. Okay, can you give us the three again?

I can bring those together and then we'll have the bonus. So first, really, you know if it's longer than the screen or it's back and forth more than three times, it should be an email, just to be aware of that, that how that's going to be read and understood by your audience. Secondly, you know always be aware of who's in the distribution list, who's on the two, who's on the CC who might have gotten added, and, as a leader, take control of that narrative and maybe eliminate some of those folks. Move people to be CC if you can control who is is getting that message. And then the third is be aware of who the audience you know above your audience and how that email is going to be used later on.

So, using appropriate grammar West snark, less irony and, I think, sarcasm you know those are tough in email, especially six months later when you reread that email you may not remember the joke that was made in the meeting 10 minutes beforehand. And so be aware of that, of how that is. And then, obviously, our bonus always take a break If you're charged up. You know, write the email, that's fine, it's cathartic, just don't hit send.

Yeah, yeah, and you just reiterated to that it lives forever and so be careful what you put out there.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean with my company and a lot of larger companies, we have a retention policy where they do get deleted. But I know smaller companies that you may have sent that email to they'll keep that forever. I know I don't, I don't delete anything, I just I'm a digital pack rat and so, yeah, those things will live forever and I think that that's a really important thing to recall.

Excellent. I think this was a good one. I think a lot of people will be like oh my gosh, I do that all the time. I need to stop doing that.

Yep, yep. These are classics.

Classic. All right, thank you. Thank you, james. Thank you for being here, quicksters. We appreciate you. James and I are both on LinkedIn. We would love it if you followed us, and if you have any questions or you want to connect with us, please do. We'd love to hear from you.

Drop us a note.

Yeah, drop us a note. So thanks for being here. Until next time, James, we'll see you next time because I appreciate you.

We appreciate you.

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