Episode 140 - Listen To This If… You Want to Up Your Email Game

Transcript

Jen (00:00:11)

Hello, hello. I am so pleased to welcome you to another episode of Listen to This If from us, the team at Let's Talk SciComm. So that's me Jen and my most excellent friend Michael. And in these episodes, we pick one little topic to have a chat about and try and share our most useful advice on.

And oh my gosh Michael, this one is very close to my heart. We are talking about how to up your email game. And oh my gosh, there's so many things here, but I feel like email is the bane of so many of our lives. It's essential, but it just, it can suck the life out of you. So what are some things we can do to improve the way we manage our email and write better emails?

Michael (00:00:57)

Yeah, I think it's great to recognise that email can suck the life out of people. And it's because we spend a lot of time on emails. So if you can make your email quick and brief and to the point, it will make it easier for the other person.

So my recommendation is to... In the subject line, you know, if there's an action that you want this other person to take. You know, review, signature request, feedback, put that in the subject line and then really quickly at the top of your email say, you know, what it is that you're looking for and have that as like a separate sentence. And then you can provide like the context after your main question.

And then just think, you know, the person reading this, they might be skim reading it. Are they going to, you know...? Are they going to get the message? And maybe think about do I need to even send an email in the first place? Maybe you don't. Maybe you can walk down the corridor, get some physical activity.

Jen (00:02:05)

Yes, that was going to be one of my main tips for sure. Ask yourself, does this actually have to be an email? Because I feel like email overload is just, I really do think it's a chronic problem.

Depending on where you are in your career or what sort of job you do, maybe email isn't a big deal for you. If that's the case, you know, I'm so pleased for you. I really am pleased for you.

Michael (00:02:27)

Pleased and jealous.

Jen (00:02:28)

And only a little bit jealous because I find just email is this constant battle and it really stresses me out. Like I, you know, depending on how many unread emails I have or just how many emails are sitting there in my inbox that I know need attention. And each one takes time.

That's the thing. In your mind, you can just whip through and fix them all. But actually, and this goes back to conversations we had last season with Tullio Rossi about AI. You know, there are definitely AI tools that I'm exploring now about how to make it quicker. You know, to write my emails, to dictate them and that sort of thing. But at the end of the day, I still think email is going to take a long time.

So I think your points Michael are so vital. And that is kind of think about how much cognitive load you are placing on the receiver of your email and think about how to fix that. So exactly like you said, that's about being really thoughtful about what's in the subject, but then also just do some editing, make the email as short and clear as possible.

And if it's just for someone, you know, if it's just for information purposes, make that clear: "FYI". But if there's a call to action and you need someone to do something. You know, I'm not against kind of bolding, highlighting. I mean, I don't know, maybe some people read it as kind of passive aggressive and if that's the case, I'm sorry. But for me, I like it if I receive an email with something in bold, particularly if the email isn't directly to me but there's something in there for me. It's really helpful if someone bolds that bit for me and I know Ooh I need to pay attention to that. So I think yeah, exactly as you say, clear call to action, good subject heading, make sure someone can search for it. I think all of that is really good.

But the other piece of advice that I would give, which I learnt from our very good friend, Jonathan O'Donnell, who we've interviewed a couple of times on this podcast. And Jonathan's advice is the opposite of what we think. And that is, take longer to reply to your emails. Now that kind of sounds counterintuitive and of course it doesn't apply if something is urgent. If somebody really needs something from you then of course, you know, get back to them as fast as you can. I'm not talking about causing other people problems.

But if there are things that aren't urgent, the problem with writing lots of emails is that you receive lots of emails. Every email you write, you're going to get a reply. And if you reply straight away, they're probably going to reply straight away. And it's just going to be, you're just [going to] spend your whole day emailing back and forth.

And so Jonathan's argument is if it's not urgent, just hold back for a few days. Just let it sit there for a couple of days. Just slow down this whole feeling of panic and overwhelm that we have around our email and recognise: actually this is not urgent, and I can afford to just hold back a little bit and give other people some time back in their day and give me some time back in my day that's not spent on email.

And I love that advice because it's the opposite of how I feel I should tackle my inbox. But when I do it that way, I feel a sense of there's no urgency here. I can take my time. I can respond thoughtfully and everything can just slow down a little bit.

Michael (00:05:36)

Yeah, I mean, you can certainly run into problems if you respond like straight away and haven't thought through, especially if it's a complex topic. So yeah, give yourself some breathing space. I think that's very good advice.

Jen (00:05:51)

Wow, it's a huge thank you to Dr. Jonathan O'Donnell for that. I often think about how wise he is and it's really helped me.

Michael (00:05:59)

I like it.

Well, good luck!

Jen (00:06:01)

So good luck taming the email beast and if you have any great answers for us, please let us know.

Michael (00:06:08)

Yeah, send us an email.

Michael (00:06:16)

Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed the episode, we'd love you to tell a friend about the podcast or leave us a review. And you can reach out to us on social media.

And we're very excited to announce that we're launching a new newsletter called the ChitChat. Check out the link in the show notes or our posts on Instagram.

And also a big thank you to our production team, Steven Tang and Madeleine Kelly.