Hate for the general email
I receive them daily. You have the hidden general email that starts with a light ‘Hi, how are you?’ applicable to everyone, and the other option is the one where people have made a bit of an effort and have taken the trouble to fill in your name after ‘Dear’. ‘Dear May-Britt’ (with a bit of bad luck it says ‘Mee-Britt’ or ‘Meghan’, which is quite impressive, because you apparently filled in my email address correctly but repeating it two lines later suddenly becomes very difficult) followed by an extremely impersonal press release. The worst are the emails that acknowledge being totally impersonal. Those are the so-called slashes. ‘Dear journalist slash blogger slash influencer’ and then another bite-sized chunk rolls out. I always wonder if any journalist/vlogger or influencer ever responds. And also if there is anyone who actually calls themselves that. Journalist, sure, although I think that title actually belongs to the Peter R. de Vries and Eric Smit types of this world and not us lipstick testers. With all due respect for our beautiful profession, I can't get the term journalist past my teeth.
In the role of a stuffy editor-in-chief (that term suits me well), I sometimes respond in a silly mood with the question of whether this email is intended for me, because in the salutation all professions are mentioned that I do not practice. And I then sigh softly when I receive a ‘Sure, also for you, you know’ back.
The general impersonal email is not limited to business communication. No, it is on the rise. It is making waves. You have the class email that is often used for improper purposes. Or the neighborhood email. And the latest trend is that everyone always replies to ‘reply all’ and then responds again as a group. I tell you: the general group email is the new WhatsApp. I sometimes look embarrassed when I see the email addresses of colleague parents. Not everyone has a nice leisure hotmail account. Suppose you work at Stibbe Advocaten with an hourly rate of €750,-, then you are not waiting to read that little Lexie had lice, but that they are now under control again?
The best lesson I learned from my colleague Franska Stuy (indeed, the one from Franska.co.uk). Our then manager sent a subject suggestion to all editors-in-chief. I must say that the email quickly slipped my mind (a side effect of group emails: you are not personally addressed so no one feels really responsible) and thus did nothing with the subject. Two weeks later, the manager sent another email to the same group. Indignant this time. Why we had not done anything with the suggestion. ‘Oops, slipped my mind,’ was my response. From the other editor-in-chief popped an out of office reply. The best response came from Franska. ‘Oh, just. I never respond to and never do anything with emails that are addressed to more people than just me.’ I think this will become my new email mantra, what about you?
