3 responses to “Responding to Emails Takes Patience”

  1. Nancy Thompson

    Very good reminder. I think words can be interpreted very differently as well, when we don’t have the body language or context to go with them. I too have learned to take it slow and read and read again before sending emails. You can’t take them back.

  2. Julie Phelps

    For many years in my recent past I was the person who answered the tough, angry or difficult emails. It was usually a challenge I enjoyed, as there is a feeling of “job well done” when you diffuse the anger. I guess I got a bit too comfortable during a certain time period of too many 12+ hours of work days. I was tired and allowed myself to go on automatic. That was when I should have been re-reading before sending. One of my replies was taken as being condescending. Upon reading my reply a day later I was thoroughly shocked, as well as embarassed. It did not sound like it could have come from me! I was not that mean-spirited person! Who used my fingers and wrote my email response?

    Lesson learned. I never again sent out an email without reading through it one more time. If it had been in response to a difficult or angry situation, I learned to mull on it for a bit prior to sending. I knew how to do the words but sometimes I let emotions get in my way. Well, I did then. Like I said, I learned my lesson.

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