The concept of “blind copy”, we learn not to do stupid things. Useful phrases for business correspondence And if you don’t send anything, what will happen then? I don't want to confirm anything
Today, courts often accept electronic correspondence as written evidence. However, to do this, it must have legal force. Meanwhile, clear and uniform rules and methods for determining the legitimacy of virtual correspondence have not yet been developed, which leads to a large number of problems.
Let's look at several ways to give emails legal force.
Long gone are the days when the only means of communication were letters written on paper. The development of economic relations between economic entities is no longer conceivable without the use of information technology. This is especially true when counterparties are located in different cities or even countries.
Communication via electronic communication helps reduce material costs, and also allows you to quickly develop a common position on specific issues.
However, such progress should not be viewed only on the positive side. Various disputes often arise between subjects of economic relations; to resolve them, they turn to the courts. The court makes a decision based on an assessment of the evidence provided by the parties.
At the same time, the relevance, admissibility, reliability of each evidence separately, as well as the sufficiency and interconnection of the evidence in their totality are analyzed. This rule is enshrined both in the Arbitration Procedure Code of the Russian Federation (clause 2 of Article 71) and in the Code of Civil Procedure of the Russian Federation (clause 3 of Article 67). In the process of determining the admissibility and reliability of the evidence provided, the court often asks questions, the solution of which significantly affects the outcome of the case.
The use of electronic document management in relations between business entities is regulated by the norms of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation. In particular, in paragraph 2 of Art. 434 states: an agreement in writing can be concluded by exchanging documents via electronic communication, which makes it possible to reliably establish that the document comes from a party to the agreement.
In accordance with paragraph 1 of Art. 71 Code of Civil Procedure of the Russian Federation and paragraph 1 of Art. 75 of the Arbitration Procedure Code of the Russian Federation, written evidence is business correspondence containing information about circumstances relevant to the consideration and resolution of the case, made in the form of a digital record and received via electronic communication.
To use electronic documents in legal proceedings, two conditions must be met. First, as already indicated, they must have legal force. Secondly, the document must be readable, that is, it must contain information that is generally understandable and accessible to perception.
This requirement follows from the general rules of legal proceedings, which presuppose the immediacy of judges’ perception of information from sources of evidence.
Often, the court refuses to admit as evidence to the case materials electronic correspondence that does not meet the above conditions, and subsequently makes a decision that does not satisfy the legal requirements of the interested party.
Let's consider the main ways to legitimize electronic correspondence before and after the start of proceedings.
Working with a notary
If the proceedings have not yet begun, then to give electronic correspondence legal force, you need to involve a notary. In paragraph 1 of Art. 102 of the Fundamentals of Legislation on Notaries (Fundamentals) states that, at the request of interested parties, a notary provides evidence necessary in court or an administrative body if there are reasons to believe that the provision of evidence will subsequently become impossible or difficult. And in paragraph 1 of Art. 103 of the Fundamentals stipulates that in order to secure evidence, the notary inspects written and material evidence.
According to paragraph 2 of Art. 102 Fundamentally, a notary does not provide evidence in a case that, at the time interested parties contact him, is being processed by a court or administrative body. Otherwise, the courts recognize notarized electronic correspondence as unacceptable evidence (Resolution of the Ninth AAS dated March 11, 2010 No. 09AP-656/2010-GK).
It is worth recalling that, based on Part 4 of Art. 103 Fundamentals, provision of evidence without notifying one of the parties and interested parties is carried out only in urgent cases.
In order to inspect evidence, a protocol is drawn up, which, in addition to a detailed description of the notary’s actions, must also contain information about the date and place of the inspection, the notary conducting the inspection, the interested parties participating in it, and also list the circumstances discovered during the inspection. The emails themselves are printed and filed with a protocol, which is signed by the persons participating in the inspection, by a notary and sealed with his seal. By virtue of the Determination of the Supreme Arbitration Court of the Russian Federation dated April 23, 2010 No. VAS-4481/10, the notarial protocol for the inspection of an electronic mailbox is recognized as appropriate evidence.
Currently, not all notaries provide services for certification of emails, and their cost is quite high. For example: one of the notaries in Moscow charges 2 thousand rubles for one page of the descriptive part of the protocol.
A person interested in providing evidence applies to a notary with a corresponding application. It should indicate:
- evidence to be secured;
- the circumstances that are supported by this evidence;
- the grounds for which evidence is required;
- at the time of contacting a notary, the case is not being processed by a court of general jurisdiction, an arbitration court or an administrative body.
Notaries inspect the contents of an electronic mailbox either remotely, that is, they use remote access to a mail server (it can be the server of a provider providing an electronic communication service under a contract; a mail server of a domain name registrar or a free Internet mail server), or directly from the computer of the interested person , on which an email program is installed (Microsoft Outlook, Netscape Messenger, etc.).
During a remote inspection, in addition to the application, the notary may need permission from the domain name registrar or Internet provider. It all depends on who exactly supports the operation of mailboxes or an electronic mail server under the contract.
Certification from the provider
Resolutions of the Ninth AAS dated 04/06/2009 No. 09AP-3703/2009-AK, dated 04/27/2009 No. 09AP-5209/2009, FAS MO dated 05/13/2010 No. KG-A41/4138-10 stipulate that the courts also recognize the admissibility of electronic correspondence , if it is certified by the Internet service provider or domain name registrar who are responsible for managing the mail server.
The provider or domain name registrar certifies electronic correspondence at the request of an interested party only if it manages the mail server and such right is specified in the service agreement.
However, the volume of electronic correspondence can be quite large, which in turn can complicate the process of providing paper documents. In this regard, the court sometimes allows the provision of electronic correspondence on electronic media. Thus, the Arbitration Court of the Moscow Region, making a Decision dated August 1, 2008 in case No. A41-2326/08, referred to the admissibility of electronic correspondence provided to the court on four CDs.
But when considering the case in the appellate instance, the Tenth AAC, by its Resolution dated 10/09/2008 in case No. A41-2326/08, recognized the reference to electronic correspondence as unfounded and canceled the decision of the court of first instance, indicating that the interested party did not submit any documents provided for by the concluded parties agreement.
Thus, emails relating to the subject of the dispute must be submitted to the court in writing, and all other documents can be submitted on electronic media.
Confirming the contents of letters by referring to them in subsequent paper correspondence will help prove the facts stated in virtual correspondence. The use of other written evidence is reflected in the Resolution of the Ninth AAS dated December 20, 2010 No. 09AP-27221/2010-GK. Meanwhile, the court, when considering the case and assessing the evidence provided by the parties, has the right not to consider paper correspondence with links to electronic correspondence admissible.
He only takes it into account and makes a decision based on a comprehensive analysis of all the evidence presented.
Get help from an expert
If the proceedings have already begun, then to give electronic correspondence legal force it is necessary to exercise the right to attract an expert. In paragraph 1 of Art. 82 of the Arbitration Procedure Code of the Russian Federation stipulates that in order to clarify issues that arise during the consideration of a case that require special knowledge, the arbitration court appoints an examination at the request of a person participating in the case, or with the consent of the persons participating in it.
If the appointment of an examination is prescribed by law or a contract, or is required to verify an application for falsification of the evidence presented, or if an additional or repeated examination is necessary, the arbitration court may appoint an examination on its own initiative. The appointment of an examination for the purpose of verifying the evidence presented is also provided for in Art. 79 Code of Civil Procedure of the Russian Federation.
In a petition to appoint a forensic examination, it is necessary to indicate the organization and specific experts who will carry it out, as well as the range of issues for which the interested party decided to apply to the court to order an examination. In addition, information about the cost and timing of such an examination should be provided and the full amount to pay for it should be deposited with the court. The involved expert must meet the requirements established for him in Art. 13 of the Federal Law “On State Forensic Expert Activities in the Russian Federation”.
Attachment to the case materials as evidence of an expert's opinion on the authenticity of electronic correspondence is confirmed by judicial practice (Decision of the Moscow Arbitration Court dated 08/21/2009 in case No. A40-13210/09-110-153; Resolution of the Federal Antimonopoly Service of the Moscow Region dated 01/20/2010 No. KG-A40 /14271-09).
Based on the contract
In paragraph 3 of Art. 75 of the Arbitration Procedure Code of the Russian Federation notes that documents received via electronic communication are recognized as written evidence if this is specified in the agreement between the parties. Accordingly, it is necessary to indicate that the parties recognize the equal legal force of correspondence and documents received via fax, the Internet and other electronic means of communication as the originals. In this case, the agreement must specify the email address from which electronic correspondence will be sent, and information about the authorized person authorized to conduct it.
The contract must stipulate that the designated email address is used by the parties not only for work correspondence, but also for transferring the results of work, which is confirmed by the position of the Federal Antimonopoly Service of the Moscow Region in Resolution No. KG-A40/12090-08 dated January 12, 2009. The Decree of the Ninth AAS dated December 24, 2010 No. 09AP-31261/2010-GK emphasizes that the contract must stipulate the possibility of using e-mail to approve technical specifications and make claims regarding the quality of services provided and work performed.
In addition, the parties may stipulate in the agreement that notifications and messages sent by email are recognized by them, but must be additionally confirmed within a certain period by courier or registered mail (Resolution of the Thirteenth AAC dated April 25, 2008 No. A56-42419/2007).
To summarize, we can say that today there is a practice of courts using electronic correspondence as written evidence. However, taking into account the requirements of procedural legislation regarding the admissibility and reliability of evidence, virtual correspondence is taken into account by the court only if it has legal force.
In this regard, a large number of problems arise, since a unified methodology for determining the legitimacy of electronic correspondence has not yet been formed. The right of an interested party to contact a notary in order to secure evidence is enshrined, but there is no regulatory act of the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation regulating the procedure for the provision of such services by notaries. As a result, there is no single approach to determining their value and forming a clear mechanism for implementing this right.
There are several ways to give electronic correspondence legal force in order to present it as evidence in court: securing electronic correspondence from a notary, certification from an Internet provider, by reference to emails in further paper correspondence, as well as confirmation of their authenticity by forensic examination.
A competent approach to the timely provision of electronic correspondence as written evidence will allow business entities to fully restore their violated rights when resolving disputes.
We send dozens of emails every day. Sometimes these are very short messages, for example: “Shall we go to lunch?” Sometimes - with the help of which you present your business or website. When there are a lot of letters and little time, we begin to rush and make mistakes. Usually trivial, like a typo, but sometimes things happen that can seriously harm your reputation and spoil your relationship with a client or employee.
This can be avoided, you just need to be collected and know about some pitfalls. Here are the most common mistakes made when sending emails. Read carefully and remember that you first need to take a short pause, check if everything is in order, and only then click on the “Send” button.
You are typing the wrong address
The most common and most unpleasant mistake. Imagine you want to send rather personal photos to a friend, but you automatically type the address of your boss or customer. And only after the letter has left do you realize with horror what has just happened. If it’s any consolation, each of us has found ourselves in this situation at least once in our lives: lawyers sent confidential documents to the opposite party, designers sent website layouts to the wrong client, etc. But when this happens to us, it seems that the ground disappears from under our feet.
Fortunately, many email services, for example Gmail, have a function. Turn it on and specify a large time interval - it’s quieter, you know.
You forgot about the attachment
You wrote that a certain file was attached to the letter, but you forgot to attach it. Another common mistake that often leads to misunderstandings and apologies. On the one hand, it’s okay, no one is perfect, but it’s better to check everything first and only then send the letter. And to avoid questions from the recipient, we recommend listing all attached files directly in the body of the letter. For example, like this:
Hello, Maxim! I am sending you several files, they are attached:
Service Agreement
GIF with a cat
You don't think about the design
They greet you, as you remember, by their clothes. If you want to prevent your email from making you want to immediately delete it, work on its form. They say you need to devote as much time to it as to the content. Fortunately, today it's easy. To do this, we recommend using the Wix ShoutOut application, selecting a suitable template and adding your text to it. No special knowledge is required, just make sure everything looks neat and beautiful. By the way, a good newsletter has its own secrets and rules, so we recommend reading our email marketing director. Don't thank me.
You do not specify the subject of the letter
The subject of the letter performs approximately the same role as the title of the text. It appears next to your name, the recipient sees it and understands what you sent him: an invoice, meeting results, job offer, website layout, etc. Remember that the topic must be clearly formulated so that if necessary, a person will quickly find your letter, and convincing so that he becomes interested, if we are talking about, say, a newsletter. Not long ago we wrote about how, if you’ve forgotten, it’s worth re-reading.
You don't save drafts
If you like to write letters in text editors, then save often, otherwise you will end up writing a letter all day, and then suddenly your computer freezes and everything is gone. Or write directly in the mail service - then all your sketches will be automatically saved in the “Drafts” folder.
You are being rude
Politeness in correspondence is no less important than in life. Here are the basic rules that must be followed by everyone:
Always thank the sender for the letter, especially if you see that he did a good job. Remember when we were all taught “magic” words as children? Let's not forget them, even though we are adults.
Stay calm, even if the matter is extremely urgent and important. Nervousness and reproaches will definitely not lead to anything good.
Begin and end your letter with common phrases. The degree of formality will depend on who you are corresponding with. If this is your boss or just an official person, do not use “Hello”, “Bye” or “Kisses”. And vice versa, if you are writing to a colleague or friend, you can do without the traditional “Sincerely.”
You don't proofread the text
Typos can ruin the whole impression, so carefully re-read the written letter, preferably several times. If you have doubts about spelling or syntax, go to Gramotu.ru. It’s better to measure seven times, that is, check, than then apologize for typos and prove that you are actually literate.
And by the way: if you are afraid of accidentally sending an unfinished letter, first write the entire text in full, and only then type the recipient’s address.
You are not putting the right people on the copy of the letter
Let's figure out who might actually receive your letter. The To field is the primary recipient. Field "Ss" - the person who will receive the copy. He is not directly related to the issue being discussed, but wants or needs to be aware. The "Bcc" field is the hidden recipients. You add them, but the primary recipient doesn't see them. And here you need to be careful: you can confuse Cc and Bcc, and then the recipient will think that he is being spied on.
Keep in mind that it is important for some people to be aware of what is happening. You don’t want to listen to reproaches about “How could you not add me to the copy?! I worked on this project for two months!” If in doubt, add everyone who has anything to do with the question. Maybe not everyone will be happy that they are being distracted, but there will be no complaints against you.
You don't subscribe
You wrote “Sincerely, Masha” and you think that everything is in order, but the recipient of the letter sits and wonders what kind of Masha this is. From the printing house? Or maybe an illustrator? To avoid leaving him guessing, set up a signature and it will be automatically added to the end of each of your messages. Be sure to include your first and last name, company name, position, and contact information, such as Skype or phone number. You can add an address - although this is advertising, it is unobtrusive.
You're choosing the wrong time
Writing letters at night is not a good idea. Reason one: you're probably terribly tired during the day, you're not thinking very well, and you're at risk of making all of the above mistakes. Reason two: the avalanche of morning mail will bury your midnight letter, and the addressee will definitely not see it in the near future. And third: apparently, you have nothing better to do if you are writing business letters at three in the morning.
Our advice: if nothing Important or Urgent has happened, send messages from Monday to Friday and during working hours, like all normal people.
Need to for your business? Create it yourself on Wix - it's easy and free!
The following expressions are most often used to write formal emails:
1. If we want to attach a file, then we indicate:
Pleasefindattached– Please accept as attachment
Please find attached my resume. – Please accept as attachment my resume.
Please find attached photos from the conference. – Please accept as attachment photos from the conference.
2. If we want to forward (redirect) a letter, we use the expression:
I've forwarded ________ to you. – I forwarded ________ to you.
I'm forwarding ________ to you. – I am sending you _______.
I've forwardedBill`s resume to you. –I redirected To you summary Bill.
I'm forwardingJohn's email to you. –I'm forwarding To youJohn's email.
3. If we want to tag someone in a copy of the letter, we use the expression:
(name) on this email |
– I have noted (name) in the copy of this email.
I` ve cc` d Umar on this email. – I marked Umar in the copy of this email.
* We`ve copied Umar tokeephimintheloop. – We have noted Umar in the copy of the letter in order to keep him informed.
Please keep me in the loop. –Please, hold me V course.
4. The following expression will help bring the letter to a close:
If you have any questions, please don`t hesitate to contact me. – If you have any questions, please contact me.
If you have any questions, please don`t hesitate to contact me.
Sincerely,
John –
If you have any questions, please contact me.
Sincerely,
John
5. To finish the letter, we use the following expressions:
I look forward to | hearingfromyou- Waiting for an answer from you. meetingyou- I look forward to meeting you. yourreply- Waiting for your answer. |
Look forward to + verb + ing- look forward)
To end an email we use the following expressions:
KindRegards (Regards) – Best wishes, best regards
WarmWishes — Best wishes
YoursTruly– Sincerely yours, with respect.
English Joke
The breakfaster in the cheap restaurant tried to make a conversation with the man beside him at the counter.
"Awful rainy spell-like the flood."
"The flood?" The tone was polite, but inquiring.
"The flood-Noah, the Ark, Mount Ararat."
The other bit off half a slice of bread, shook his head, and mumbled thickly:
“Hain’t read to-day’s paper yit.”
Most email clients, including Gmail, Mail.ru, Microsoft Outlook, Mozilla Thunderbird, allow you to put multiple recipients in A copy(in English the abbreviation is accepted SS), or Bcc (CCB). IN Copies recipients can see other people's addresses. In the second case, the identity of additional recipients is hidden.
Adding a recipient's address
To specify the recipient(s) of the email, enter their email address in the field To whom (That):Some email clients allow you to simply enter your username into a field, which is then automatically filled in by the program.
If you use this field to send email to multiple people, each of them will be able to see the full list of other recipients.
How to create a copy of an email
Field CC or Copy used to exchange electronic messages in a more indirect way than the field To whom. If you are not directly addressing the person in your email, but would like that person to follow the conversation in the email thread or simply be aware of the topic, the field Copy would be a great option. The addressee, who is in Copies letters, receives an unread letter in his mailbox, just like the one who was placed in the box To whom; the only difference is who you address the letter to first in the body of your email. In the professional world, mailing to Copies is used very widely and serves to ensure that colleagues are aware of various events and topics.You can list email recipients by simply entering a list of addresses in the field Copy, which is usually located immediately below the field To whom. Everyone in this chain of recipients will be able to see the names and email addresses of all other recipients:
How to BCC an Email
Every email client (Gmail, Outlook, Mozilla Thunderbird, Yahoo, etc.) allows the sender of an email to reach a large number of people without exposing their information to other users in the email chain. This function is called BCC or Hidden copy. You can hide recipients by entering their addresses in the field Hidden copy instead of using fields To whom And Copy:You can use this feature for both individual and group emails. This is especially useful if you want to keep your contacts private, protect them from spam and unwanted emails, or simply if you don't want your recipients to know who received the same message.
Field Hidden copy not always available by default for all email clients. For example, in Outlook You will need to go to Options to access settings; V Thunderbird you will need to select this function from the drop-down menu; V Gmail need to press a button Copy And Hidden copy; V Windows Live Mail You will need to press the keys simultaneously Alt + B.
Image: © Web Hosting - Unsplash.com
What is email? In the modern business world this is:
- Your face. It is with the help of email that you can create a positive image in the eyes of the counterparty or spoil the first impression.
- Your working tool. A lot of communication with the outside world takes place via email. Therefore, if you are proficient in this instrument, you can make your life a lot easier.
- A powerful distraction. The outside world is trying to get at you, distract you and lead you astray through email.
From this perspective, let’s look at working with email. Let's start with something simple.
Formatting a letter
I use the Mozilla Thunderbird email client, so I will use it as an example. Let's create a new letter and go from top to bottom through the list of fields.
To whom. Copy. Hidden copy
Some may not know, but "To" in Mozilla can be changed to "Cc" or "Bcc".
- To whom: we write the main recipient or several recipients separated by semicolons.
- Copy: we write to someone who should read the letter, but from whom we do not expect a reaction.
- Hidden copy: we are writing to someone who should read the letter, but should remain unknown to the other recipients of the letter. It is especially appropriate to use for mass mailing of business letters, such as notifications.
Wrong in mass mailings, indicate recipients using the “Copy” or “To” fields. Several times a year I receive letters that list 50–90 recipients in the “Cc” field. There is a violation of privacy. Not all of your recipients need to know who else you are working with on a similar topic. It’s good if these are people who know each other. What if there are competing companies on the list that don’t know about each other? At a minimum, you need to be prepared for unnecessary explanations, and at maximum, to terminate cooperation with one of them. Do not do it this way.
Letter subject
Professional mailing services often write (sometimes sensibly) about the importance of the email subject line on their corporate blogs. But most often we are talking about sales letters, where the subject of the letter solves the problem “the email should be opened.”
We are discussing daily business correspondence. Here the theme solves the problem “the letter and its author should be easily identified and then found.” Moreover, your diligence will return to you in the form of karma of numerous response letters, only with prefixes Re: or Fwd, among which you will have to look for the desired letter on the topic.
Twenty letters is the volume of one-day correspondence for a middle manager. I’m not talking about entrepreneurs and business owners at all; their number of letters sometimes goes off scale at 200 or more per day. Therefore once again: do not send emails with an empty subject.
So, how to formulate the subject line of an email correctly?
Mistake #1 : Only the company name in the subject. For example, “Sky” and that’s it. Firstly, you are probably not the only one from your company communicating with this counterparty. Secondly, such a topic does not bring any meaning, because the name of your company is already visible from the address. Thirdly, guess what your own mailbox will look like with this approach to correspondence? Something like this.
Is it convenient to search on such topics?
Mistake #2 : flashy, selling headline. It's great if you know how to write such headlines. But is it appropriate to use these skills in business correspondence? Remember the purpose of a business email subject line: not to sell, but to provide identification and search.
Text of the letter
There are many writing guides for different occasions. For example, Maxim Ilyakhov, Alexander Amzin and other masters of words have a lot of useful information. I advise you to read their articles, at least to improve general literacy and improve the overall style of written speech.
In the process of writing a letter, we must make several decisions sequentially.
A matter of politeness . At the beginning of the letter, you can blur into pleasantries or even tenderness in the spirit of “My dear Rodya, it’s been more than two months since I talked to you in writing, from which I myself suffered and even didn’t sleep some nights, thinking.” Very polite and very costly, both in terms of time to write such an introduction, and in terms of the interlocutor’s time to read it. Correspondence is business, remember? Not an essay in the epistolary genre for a competition or a letter to Raskolnikov’s mother, but business correspondence.
We respect our time and the recipient's!
It only makes sense to introduce yourself and recall the circumstances of your acquaintance in the first letter sent after a fleeting meeting at an exhibition. If this is a continuation of cooperation or ongoing correspondence, in the first letter of the day we write: “Hello, Ivan”, in the second and subsequent ones: “Ivan, ...”.
Appeal . I have always been concerned about the question of who to address in a letter if there are several recipients. Recently I wrote a letter addressed to three girls named Anna. Without any doubt, I wrote “Hello, Anna” and didn’t worry. But such luck is not always the case.
What if there are three or even seven recipients and they do not have the same name? You can list them by name: “Good afternoon, Rodion, Pulcheria, Avdotya and Pyotr Petrovich.” But it's long and takes time. You can write: “Hello, colleagues!”
For myself, I use the rule of addressing by name the person in the “To” field. And don’t contact those in the copy at all. This rule also allows you to more accurately determine (one!) the addressee of the letter and the purpose of this letter.
Citation . Often correspondence is a chain of letters with questions and answers - in a word, a dialogue. It is considered good form not to delete the correspondence history and to write your response at the top of the quoted text, so that when you return to this correspondence a week later, you can easily read the dialogue from top to bottom, descending by date.
For some reason, the default setting in Mozilla is “Place cursor after quoted text.” I recommend changing it in the “Tools” → “Account Options” → “Composing and Addressing” menu. It must be so.
Purpose of the letter . There are two types of business letters:
- when we simply inform the interlocutor (for example, a report on the work done for the month);
- and when we want something from the interlocutor. For example, so that he approves the attached invoice for payment.
As a rule, there are many times more encouraging letters than reporting letters. If we want to achieve something from the interlocutor, it is very important to say this in a letter in plain text. The call to action should be accompanied by a name and be the last sentence in the letter.
Wrong : “Porfiry Petrovich, I know who hacked the old woman to death.”
Right : “Porfiry Petrovich, it was I who hacked the old woman to death, please take measures to arrest me, I’m tired of suffering!”
Why should the correspondent think for you what to do with this letter? After all, he may make the wrong decision.
Signature in the text . She must be. Moreover, all email clients allow you to configure automatic signature substitution, for example the classic “Sincerely, …”. In Mozilla, this is done in the “Tools” → “Account Options” menu.
Whether or not to write contacts in the signature is a personal matter for everyone. But if you are in any way connected with sales, be sure to write. Even if the deal does not take place as a result of communication, in the future you will be easily found using the contacts from the signature.
Finally, one more feature of the letter body for those interlocutors who don’t like (can’t, don’t want, don’t have time) to answer your letters. Please indicate the default in the body of the letter. For example, “Porfiry Petrovich, if you don’t come to arrest me before 12:00 Friday, then I consider myself amnestied.” Of course, the deadline must be real (you shouldn’t send the text from the example on Friday at 11:50). The recipient must be physically able to read and act on your letter. Such “silence” relieves you of responsibility for the interlocutor’s failure to respond. As always, you need to approach the use of this feature wisely. If a person responds to your letters on time and regularly, such an ultimatum may, if not offend him, then stress him out a little or lead him to decide not to answer the letter right now, but make you wait until Friday.
Attachments
Letters often come with attachments: resumes, commercial proposals, estimates, schedules, scans of documents - a very convenient tool and at the same time a source of popular errors.
Error : huge investment size. I often receive emails with attachments up to 20 MB in size. As a rule, these are scans of some documents in TIFF format, with a resolution of 600dpi. The correspondent's email program will almost certainly freeze for several minutes in a futile attempt to load a preview of the attachment. And God forbid the recipient tries to read this letter on a smartphone...
Personally, I immediately delete such letters. Don't want your email to end up in the trash before it's read? Check the size of the investment. It is recommended that it be no more than 3 MB.
What to do if it exceeds?
- Try reconfiguring your scanner to a different format and resolution. For example, PDF and 300dpi produce quite readable scans.
- Think about programs such as WinRar or 7zip archiver. Some files compress perfectly.
- What to do if the attachment is huge and you can’t compress it? For example, an almost empty accounting database weighs 900 MB. Cloud information storages will come to the rescue: Dropbox, Google Drive and the like. Some services, such as Mail.ru, automatically convert huge attachments into links to cloud storage. But I prefer to manage my information stored in the cloud myself, so I don’t welcome automation from Mail.ru.
And one more not entirely obvious recommendation about investments - their Name . It must be understandable and acceptable to the recipient. Once we in the company were preparing a commercial proposal in the name of... let it be Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky. I received a letter from the manager with a draft CP for approval, and the attachment included a file named “ForFedi.docx”. The manager who sent me this had a dialogue that went something like this:
Dear manager, are you personally ready to approach this respected man and call him Fedya to his face?
Somehow, no, he’s a respected man, everyone calls him by his first name and patronymic.
Why did you name the attachment “For Fedi”? If I send it to him right now, do you think he will buy axes from us using this CP?
I was going to rename it later...
Why prepare a time bomb - the refusal of a potential client - or create extra work for yourself by renaming the file? Why not immediately name the attachment correctly: “For Fyodor Mikhailovich.docx” or even better - “KP_Sky_Axes.docx”.
So, we have more or less sorted out email as a “face”. Let's move on to looking at email as a tool for effective work and talk about its distraction component.
Working with letters
Email is a powerful distraction. As with any distraction, email needs to be dealt with by tightening rules and introducing work schedules.
At a minimum, you need to turn off ALL notifications about mail arrivals. If the email client is configured by default, you will be notified with a sound signal, an icon next to the clock will blink, and a preview of the letter will be shown. In a word, they will do everything to first tear you away from painstaking work, and then plunge you into the abyss of unread letters and unviewed mailings - minus an hour or two from your life.
Some people have powerful willpower that allows them not to be distracted by notifications, but ordinary people are better off not tempting fate and turning them off. In Mozilla Thunderbird, this is done through the menu "Tools" → "Settings" → "General" → "When new messages appear."
If there are no notifications, how can you understand that a letter has arrived?
Very simple. You yourself, consciously, set aside time to sort through your mail, open your email client and see all the unread messages. This can be done twice a day, for example, at lunch and in the evening, or during forced downtime, for example, in traffic jams.
People often ask, what about response times and urgent letters? I answer: you do not have urgent letters in your mail. Unless you work in the customer support department (this department has its own rules for working with mail).
If there are urgent letters, the sender will notify you about this through other channels - telephone, SMS, Skype. Then you will consciously go into your email client and process urgent mail. All time management gurus (for example, Gleb Arkhangelsky with his “Time Drive”) declare a standard response to email within 24 hours. This is a normal rule of good manners - do not expect instant replies via email from your interlocutor. If there is an urgent letter, notify about it through faster communication channels.
So, we turned off notifications and now turn on the email client according to our schedule.
What to do when we go to the mail and engage in an activity called “sorting out email”? Where is the beginning and end of this work?
I've heard a lot about the zero inbox system, but, unfortunately, I haven't met a single person using it. I had to reinvent my wheel. There are articles on this topic on Lifehacker. For example, " ". Below I will talk about the zero inbox system in my interpretation. I would be grateful if GTD gurus would comment and add or improve the described system.
It is important to understand and accept that email is not a task scheduler or archive for your activities. Therefore, the Inbox folder should always be empty. Once you start sorting through your inbox, don't stop or be distracted by anything until you've emptied this folder.
What to do with emails in your inbox? You need to go through each letter sequentially and delete it. Yes, just highlight and press Delete on your keyboard. If you can’t bring yourself to delete the letter, you’ll have to decide what to do with it.
- Can you answer it in three minutes? Do I need to answer it? Yes, it is necessary, and the answer will take no more than three minutes, then answer immediately.
- You must answer, but preparing an answer will take more than three minutes. If you use a task scheduler that allows you to convert an email into a task, turn the email into a task and forget about it for a while. For example, I use the absolutely wonderful service Doit.im. It allows you to generate a personal email address: you forward the letter to it, and it turns into a task. But if you don’t have a task scheduler, move the letter to the “0_Run” subfolder.
- After quickly replying to a letter, turning it into a task, or simply reading it, you need to decide what to do with this message next: delete it or send it to one of the folders for long-term storage.
Here are the long-term storage folders I have.
- 0_Execute. I don’t have such a folder, but if you don’t have a planner, I repeat, you can put letters that require detailed work here. This folder also needs to be cleaned regularly, but with a thoughtful approach at a time specially allocated for this.
- 1_Ref. Here I put letters with background information: welcome letters with logins from various web services, tickets for upcoming flights, and so on.
- 2_Projects. An archive of correspondence on partners and projects with which there are current relationships is stored here. Naturally, a separate folder has been created for each project or partner. In the partner’s folder I put letters not only from his employees, but also letters from Neb employees related to this partner. Very convenient: if necessary, all correspondence on the project is at hand in a couple of clicks.
- 3_Museum. This is where I put those letters that it would be a pity to delete, and the benefit of them is not obvious. Folders with closed projects from “2_Projects” are also moved here. In short, the “Museum” stores the first candidates for removal.
- 4_Documents. Here are letters with electronic samples of documents that may be useful in the future for accounting, for example, reconciliation reports from clients, tickets for trips taken. The folder has many similarities with the “2_Projects” and “1_Reference” folders, only accounting information is stored in it, and management information is stored in the “2_Projects” folder. In “4_Documents” there is dead information, and in “2_Projects” there is live information.
- 5_Knowledge. Here I only put really useful newsletters that I want to return to after a while for inspiration or to find solutions.
There are other email client settings that are important for the operation of this system. First, by default in Thunderbird there is a “Mark messages as read” checkbox. I prefer to do this consciously, so down with the flag! To do this, go to the menu “Tools” → “Settings” → “Advanced” → “Reading and Display”.
Secondly, we use filters . Previously, I actively used filters that automatically forwarded letters to the appropriate folders based on the sender's address. For example, letters from a lawyer were moved to the “Lawyer” folder. I abandoned this approach for several reasons. First: letters from a lawyer in 99% of cases relate to some project or partner, which means they must be moved to the folder of this partner or project. Second: I decided to add awareness. You yourself must decide where a specific letter should be stored, and it is more convenient to look for unprocessed messages in only one place - in the inbox. Now I use filters only for organizing automatic regular letters from various systems into folders, that is, letters that do not require me to make decisions. Filters in Mozilla Thunderbird are configured in the menu “Tools” → “Message Filters”.
So, with the right approach, email should take from 10 to 60 minutes a day, depending on the volume of correspondence.
Yes, and one more thing. Have you already turned off notifications about the arrival of new letters? ;)