- cross-posted to:
- adhd@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- adhd@lemmy.world
Why YSK: These email tips are helpful for people who struggle with boundaries and want to communicate more assertively.
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Some of these are good, some are just needlessly assertive nonsense. Especially the two where it’s actively refusing to acknowledge fault or apologize for it, which is standard PR crap. Refusing to apologize and instead saying “thanks for your patience” is what I expect to hear from my ISP when they miss their scheduled install, not from a coworker.
There’s nothing wrong with being a normal human being that is capable of admitting their own shortcomings. If never saying sorry means “being a boss” then that explains why there’s so many sociopaths as CEOs.
“Hope that make sense?” Vs “Let me know if you have any questions.”
The latter is saying “here’s the explanation, figure it out, bother me again if you can’t”. The fromer, while poorly worded, is being helpful, actively attempting to make sure the person understands before leaving them to it. It’s both a kindness and doing your due diligence.
Seriously… and oftentimes just combining both works better. “Hey sorry I’m late, I appreciate you all being patient” or “Hope that all makes sense, but please feel free to ask any questions if they come up”
I’m so happy to see a sane comment at the top here. So many of these are just stupid and border on alpha male don’t take not shit or admit fault crap.
I think it goes the other way too. For people that tend to apologize too much, even when it’s not their fault, mixing in a “thanks for your patience” is a good way to balance it out a bit.
I’m torn. I feel like admitting guilt and owning up to your failures is a virtue, but I’m not sure the rest of the world agrees with me
Neurotypical enough to read body language, neurodivergent enough to never understand why
I’m with you. Just being honest about a failure is fine. Doesn’t have to be a dramatic apology, just an acknowledgment with a bit of regret perhaps.
That makes sense. I think that’s a different issue than I was thinking. Ultimately if it’s a sincere comment I think that’s the most important thing.
“Thank you for your patience” gives me such a visceral reaction, lol
Agreed! It’s like…. You know we’re emailing other people too right? Not everyone is a delicate fucking flower that needs to be coddled. Yes there are better ways to word stuff, but typing as a medium often just leaves too much up to interpretation. A difficult conversation should be discussed on a call.
To be honest, I find most of these passive aggressive and patronizing.
I agree, but, you’d be surprised how many people find many of these seemingly innocuous distinctions offensive (if only a little bit). For example, I was once chided by HR for saying ‘no problem’ during a seemingly friendly discussion.
Seems like a toxic work environnement to get chided for so little…
Agreed. Got my revenge though. They got fired a week after I quit working there.
If someone has a problem with “no problem,” they have a problem.
I mean apparently some people think a thumbs up in a chat is passive aggressive.
👍
I don’t know how else to explain it, but thumbsup is the boomerest emoji.
Nah, mate. 😱 is the boomerest emoji
I do NP!
Most? I can definitely see “when can I expect an update?”, that one’s terrible. “It would be best if we” sounds pretty self-assured without a modifier such as “in my opinion” (which is what the original option was doing). “Nice catch!” is also a bit too honeyed and casual as well. But I don’t see a problem with the rest of them.
Nah. By my count, 1 is context dependent, 2 are okay, the remaining 6 are kinda cunty.
I actually like nice catch, as long as it’s not an egregious error. There are often going to be mistakes in a document, even when prepared by someone completely competent. This acknowledges someone as being part of a process instead of focusing on an error.
it’s a guide to being a soulless corporate cog
“When can I expect an update” makes you sound like a micro managing POS
Yeah some of these sound straight up aggressive lol
My go to is usually like “I just wanted to touch base on [topic]” if I want an update on something without seeming like I’m pressuring them.
YSK, the person that embraces all of these, as written, is RIGHTFULLY perceived as an assholes by their peers.
Some of them are great and can even make things less awkward for the other person. The “small error” one for example. The “I have an appointment” one is necessary when talking with higher ups in big companies who completely devalue your needs. But some are assholish, yeah.
“It’d be easier to discuss in person” means “I don’t want a record of this because it’s either illegal or shows my incompetence”.
Any meeting that they want to talk about in writing should ALWAYS be recorded.
Also, carefully laying thoughts out in text for 40 minutes takes a lot less time than explaining it meaningfully to multiple people, probably more than once if it was important enough. Absolutely nothing wrong with that.
To me calls are more about efficiency, I prefer to have a call and talk through a complex issue for 15 min instead of needing 5+ back and forth emails over an afternoon to get everyone on the same page.
Couldn’t agree more.
Yes, either that or “I haven’t thought this through well enough that I can explain it in writing, so please let me fumble through an oral explanation and—in all likelihood—waste your time”.
Or, “I’m dyslectic and would prefer to talk rather than write”, which is fair enough, I think.
All of these are really good examples of writing a good email, except the bottom left one.
The “wrong” example is perfectly fine, and the “correct” example is pretty rude unless you’re a project manager addressing your team. Even if you were a project manager, it’s still pretty rude.
I totally agree, bottom left one screams of project manager that scheduled too much in your sprint and they’re pressuring you to finish everything asap
Also it depends on if the person holding you up is the client or some other employee at your company.
Often it is the client the holding you up. In which case the best thing to do is send them an email about a week before the actual target date just to remind them, especially if they’ve done this before.
My personal ones for corporate use:
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Never use I when you can use we.
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Even if you’re the only one working on a project, never refer to it as yours. Always refer to it as ours.
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Don’t apologize, present solutions.
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Don’t say “read my fucking email again you goddamn illiterate moron”, say “As previously noted in our communications…”
The last one is particularly important if you like to eat.
So that’s where I’ve been going wrong at previous jobs. Definitely taking note.
I will also attach old emails rather than repeat myself.
“Per my last email…”
good ‘ol corporate clap back
Our company “russian anthem starts playing”
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In a good workplace, none of these fucking matter…
Yup, I just talk the way I want to talk.
I talk with my own character, politely and everyone is happy.
I don’t understand what businesses some people are working in that you’d need to be so careful with how you talk.
I work for a global multi billion dollar company and never had issues, plus the higher ups don’t even talk like this in meetings unless it’s some official email or something.
A companies in which managers are constantly telling their employees what they didn’t do good (which is actually what they didn’t do that the manager wanted them to do). These are usually micromanagers/new managers.
This is borderline toxic management lol.
Good luck finding a good workplace in a capitalist society.
I work IT at a college, its pretty good here. Definitely not perfect, but people are pretty easy going where they don’t care about stuff like this.
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Half of it is fragile CEO ego reply
Yeah seriously, there’s nothing wrong with admitting you made a mistake.
Its not that simple. Its ok to apologize sometimes. But not so apologize every fucking time like I do for every minor slide. Also I can see the usefulness to just make the shot call instead of staying 1h writing that message/email. Others are ok too.
I write emails for an hour sometimes. Some things you want to have in writing so you can point back to it later. I work in a government position and for a lot of the folks I deal with I need to be able to show I told them this on this date and the trail that goes along with it to be able to take action on what they did that they shouldn’t have or didn’t do that they should have. That hour on an email could prevent or shorten tons of meetings and headaches. Just depends on your job.
Oh I know exactly what you mean. When I was in my government position I would write paragraphs of information as a response to what some may think was a simple question, but you’re right, in those types of positions you have to over explain because it saves a lot of headache going back and forth.
Yeah you’re right. I’m in IT. Some stuff sometimes is better discussed via short call. But in government positions I can see you need to have it all on record sure.
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God I hate forced formality like this. This is the kind of shit Gen Z and millennials are rebelling against and I’m all for it. It is stupid for us to encourage people to be themselves and then to expect them to act like a completely different person at work, including the way they talk.
You may see it as forced formality, but these tips were created by a person with ADHD to help others who struggle with setting boundaries, especially with time. The creator is a Millennial comic artist. It helps me be more myself when I respect my schedule and don’t over-apologize, but I can understand that not everyone sees it the same way.
I think you can do all of the things you said without being overly formal about everything! For reference I have ADHD too. ☺️
I honestly don’t see these as being overly formal, but I worked in finance and real estate legal compliance for many years and that may have warped my perception. I think it all depends on your environment and how well the person reading this knows you (aka will they be able to recognize your intended tone?)
I don’t read formality in these either, fwiw. in fact they’re generally pretty casual.
People write work emails differently, but I write more like the “don’t” list than the “boss” list in most situations. I also rarely put much thought into it unless it’s an extremely delicate situation. The only problem I have with this post is it’s presumption that your way is the boss way and the other way is somehow inferior.
I’d never say ‘always happy to help’ because sometimes I’m actually not, particularly if a client is a pain and badgers me constantly. I don’t want to invite more interruption
Some of these are great. “Could you do” takes the burden off the other person to propose something initially, and suggests respect for their time. “I will need to leave for” begs forgiveness rather than asks permissions, and since you are communicating it, it gives others the opportunity to correct your decision. These are examples of saving everyone time while still communicating them. Being too nice can be a time waste, like saying hello and then waiting for a response before asking your question.
Some of these take away the autonomy of the other person though, and that’s shitty. “When can I expect an update?” is one of those. It would be better to express this in terms of what you need and why, like “I am reporting to X person at noon tomorrow on this, could you give me an update before then?”
Of course, whether you say “just checking in” or “when can I expect…”, if you have no good reason (micromanaging is not a good reason) for checking in then you’re just being an asshole.
The thank you for your patience one has always rubbed me wrong. There’s honor in apologizing in my opinion. I do like the making a mistake one though and I’ve tried to adopt that mentality when I’m working with QA on something I’ve merged. I want them to feel good about finding the mistakes and I want to avoid an adversarial relationship. I’ve learned that I get way better tickets from QA if they like how I treat them. Treat them like valuable experts and they’ll act like valuable experts.
I don’t like it, and will always apologize if it is my fault.
Honestly, I think its terrible advice lol. This is the type of shit that makes people not like management.
The thank you for your patience one has always rubbed me wrong.
I wouldn’t say wrong - it is disrespectful since I wasn’t patient by choice. You fucked up, you own it. But then I’m not a native speaker, maybe it just feels that way in my country.
I’m a native speaker, and it comes off as condescending to me.
“Thank you for your patience” should really come after an apology for the delay, depending on the reason. Owning up to the fact that you aren’t on schedule is not a failing at all, and acknowledging that your correspondent is dealing with the situation gracefully just serves to further smooth things over.
