With technology advancing right in front of us, e-mails are becoming more popular than ever as a form of communication. When e-mails first began, many people used short form versions of words to be able to communicate to each other, while some even have that odd sideways happy face or any other emoticon at the end to show their emotions. Even though that this still occurs within the business world, the communication channel continues to mature every year and with that, messages are beginning to be more professional and more grammatically correct. Today, it is estimated that over 85 billion e-mails are sent everyday around the world, and that people are more likely to e-mail than to use the telephone if chosen to.
There is one disadvantage that comes with writing e-mails instead of speaking over the phone. Whomever the e-mail went to when you were sending it, it is stored on their computer. Even if the person on the other end deletes the message, it can still end up being saved from the hard-drive of the computer itself. An example of this involved a long-term British Columbia politician, James Coleridge. He ended up being forced to resign his position for engaging in "deceit and lies" during an election campaign. Some people don't even end up realizing that the receiver could simply forward the message to just a couple of their friends, and then they send it to a couple of their friends, and this cycle just continues on and then the message could end up going world-wide at one point if the cycle never stops.
Personally, I take the time to think out the e-mails I send before I hit the "send" button. Especially in the workplace where I currently work at, I occasionally forward e-mails between customers to let them gather information on products the company carries and the value of them. You have to communicate in a professional manner in order for the customer to feel like they are being treated with respect. This involves anyone else in the workplace too. If you're in an office and you're communicating back and forth with other employees working there or even your boss for that matter, you want to be treated with respect right? Well proper communication will allow that to happen, seeing as there aren't any emoticons or "lol"'s within the message. That person will have the chance to give that respect back to you in the reply they send to you.
With proper grammar and professionalism in e-mails, communication between people will become more understandable, and also allow more respect within the workplace between employees and their boss and/or manager. Do you agree?
