And perhaps not surprisingly, those same people thought they were correct 80% of the time. 50/50 odds are horrible in any scenario, whether you're trying to close a deal or convince a group of people where to go for lunch. An easy way to avoid the 50/50 gamble is by simply avoiding unnecessary emotion in your email.
That may not always be possible or practical so if you email list find you've got to express your emotions, always request a call or in-person follow up as soon as possible. Left alone, misinterpretation of tone can result in the single biggest time and productivity killer. 2. Recognize That Relationship Disparity Matters If we think of email communication as flat, it's not hard to understand why it fails us in so many circumstances. Let's say you're the HR manager and you send a follow up email to a recent interviewee.
You were less than impressed with them but want to keep your boss in the loop of your progress so you add her in Cc to the response. Now, you've sent one message to two different people, both of whom have very different relationships with (you) the sender. This phenomenon doesn't really exist in live conversation and email tends to fail us here. The sender understands both the disparity and intent clearly but his recipients may not.