Text etiquette:
Be cautious about your content in work-related messages
If you look for work-related horror stories, you’ll likely find that many of them involve mishaps and misreads via digital communication. Whether it’s the accidental-replyall off-color comment to the entire department, the savage criticism of a boss who’s actually on the cc: list or the errant anatomical text to a co-worker, most of us have been on the receiving — and possibly sending — end of a groan-inducing, potentially career-ending piece of content.
“I’m the guy who replied all to a message about my boss taking a medical leave from our director of HR,” says Joseph P., a Chicago advertising manager who didn’t want his last name used in this story. “I removed the director of HR from the list when I replied all but I didn’t even bother to look through the list of the other people on the email. I assumed it was just the 15 or so co-workers in my department.”
Joseph assumed wrong.
Not only was his boss on the email, but so were his division’s vice president and his firm’s CEO. And it didn’t take long for his coworkers to let him know he’d made a huge mistake. “There was this gasp from the cubicles around me,” he says. “I don’t even think I’ve heard an actual gasp before that email or since that email, but trust
me, I heard a collective gasp. And I knew my email had something to do with it.”
Joseph says his first reaction was to reread his actual response — did he go too far? Had he said too much? — and figured he probably shocked some of his coworkers with his blunt response but assumed his reputation for crass comments and foul language wouldn’t merit more
than a few shaking heads. “I can’t repeat it, obviously, but I essentially wrote that I didn’t know people could take
medical leave for being stupid or being a jerk, but those aren’t the words I used,” he says. “But then some names caught my eye in the cc: box. And I looked again. And I checked out the whole list and in about five seconds, I was like ‘oh, man, Start packing up your stuff.’”
Accidents happen
In any relationship, whether it’s with family, friends or coworkers, there are going to be a few general errors when it comes to digital communication but let’s face it, it’s highly doubtful you’d get fired for using “your” instead of “you’re.” But insulting your boss. In front of his boss. With some indelicate language? As the movie trope goes, that’s not going to end well.
“The grammar stuff, the occasional swear word, even something kind of mean can be disregarded because everyone does it. But when it’s something really cruel and it’s done in front of a large audience, that’s pretty bad,” says Steve Nichols, a retired HR director living in Burlington, Vermont.
And make no mistake — Joseph’s email error was bad. “It turns out [Joseph’s boss] was taking leave because he had stomach cancer,” Joseph says. “I felt like a complete jerk. And I was let go by the end of the week.”
But that wasn’t the worst of it. “I lost five years of excellent work and I destroyed some great potential references,” he says. “I still have friends from there but I had to do a lot of explaining when the ‘so, why did you leave your last job’ question came up.”
Casual gone bad
Some workplace experts think the casual approach employees often take with each other can result in some blind spots when it comes to communicating with others. “We feel so comfortable with our friends at work that sometimes we forget the casual stuff we say to each other on the elevator doesn’t translate to a text, email or voicemail,” says Jane Miller, a career coach in Nashville, Tennessee. “And it’s so easy to communicate these days, we don’t put a lot of thought into what we’re sending.”
Nichols offers a simple solution when using digital communication. “Think about the texting issues you’ve had with friends or with a partner, or maybe your parents,” he says. “You’re making a sarcastic remark on a text but it’s not received that way at all. Even something as simple as a short answer like ‘that’s fine’ will come off as snippy depending on the voice the reader hears in his or her head.”
Miller agrees. “Texts are worse than emails when it comes to writing something that might offend someone,” she says. “And as text use picks up, we’ll have to be more cautious. With email, it’s right there in front of us. We can read it back before we hit the send button. With a text, it’s more an extension of what we immediately think — right from our brain to our fingers to our recipient.”
Miller suggests reading each work-related text before sending it, even if it involves some scrolling. “And read it like you’re saying it directly to their face,” she says. “You’ll usually catch the bad texts that way. It’s like when you read something you sent afterward, you cringe. Do your cringing before you hit send.”