A few weeks ago, I had an interesting encounter at a client’s office who was exploring our Development Journey Solutions. As I was walking into her office, I read a poster on her door, “Nothing Good Comes From Hitting Reply All”. She had a specific complaint – one that I too share!
Some people, just to prove how productive they are, make other people unproductive by sending out emails that are not relevant. All this hampers someone else’s productivity! Of course, the opposite is also true. Some email threads are intentional – to update progress on discussions that are common to a set of people. And here, sometimes people hit only reply (instead of reply all) and loop everyone out.
The first world challenge of email etiquette and prioritization is real! Despite seeming so simple, it is complex for some to work out on what needs more attention and what can be skipped. We often see that this poor judgement in prioritization and handling of emails flows into other aspects of work for leaders.
So, when building the content in our Development Journeys around productivity, personal effectiveness and managing self, we run an interesting FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) and JOMO (Joy of Missing Out) activity for people to figure out when to reply all, when to bcc and when to just reply!
