“Reply All and Other Email Gaffes” is a good article for anyone who sends email. I send an average of 50 emails per day and I see all the mistakes that people make when emailing. (Don’t tell anyone, but I even learned a few things myself from this article.)

I would highly recommend this for our board members or other neighborhood leaders who have to deal with community feedback and other email that is public. Often times, as a board member, you have to handle upset or even irate residents that aren’t so kind on email. My advice is to keep your cool, even when they aren’t. It’s so easy to read emotion into an email and want to respond or “flame” that person back. But when you do, it always turns into a bad situation. The article says it best, “e-mail is not the place to make negative comments.”

The only thing in the article that I disagree with is the “Poor editing” rule. Typo’s are a way of life online. Everything is published so quickly, and the message is rarely lost because of a misspelling or two. I’ve emailed with CEO’s who refuse to use capital letters in their email. (Not sure how that’s possible when Outlook automatically does it for you in most cases. Maybe they’re not using Outlook.) On the other hand, when you’re applying for a job or want to leave an impression, you might just give that email another look.