Email Etiquette

By the time you finish this course and leave the university, you will want to have practiced appropriate ways to communicate via email. If you just said, "Ho hum," then perhaps you should continue reading anyway.

Remember that when you communicate via email, you cannot provide eye contact and body language to help explain yourself, so your message may be misunderstood. Sometimes the thread of a message is lost, making readers rely on memory (which is often faulty). And if you need the reader to act on your request, best manners will help you be successful.

Steps to Successful Email Communications

Set up your email program

  1. Read these tutorials:
    How to set up your Email software
    The ONID web site provides set up tutorials for several email applications.
    Frequently Asked Questions
    About using WebMail.
  2. Automatically include the previous message when replying.
    • If you leave off the previous message, the recipient (me) may not remember what your answer refers to.
    • This option is what makes email more useful than a face to face conversation; the whole conversation is recorded for future reference.
  3. Set up a signature to appear at the end of each email message.
    • Some terms I will have 100 students, help me communicate effectively by telling me who you are.
    • Include these items:
      • First and last name
      • Email address
      • Blog address (for this course)

Write messages with proper etiquette

  1. Add CS 391 to the message's subject line.
    • So I can sort my mail by class.
    • So it doesn't look like spam and get deleted.
  2. Use this salutation:
    • Ms. Van Londen
      • I am not a professor, just an instructor, I don't have a PhD, and, unless we've been introduced face to face, use my last name, not first name. This last point seems quite formal I realize, but that's how it works in the business world, especially if you communicate with professionals offshore.
      • Also, there is a tendency for students to refer to their female faculty with their first name and their male faculty with their last name. Show the same amount of respect to females by addressing them with their last name. I will do the same for you.
  3. Use a positive tone.
    • But keep the !!! to a minimum; there is no need to shout with every sentence.
    • If you want me to do something, please and thank you work wonders.
    • Any rude, demanding messages will be ignored.

Attach files in appropriate formats

Not all files are meant to be emailed to others, though most people do it anyway because they do not understand the consequenses. Please consider:

  • Not everyone owns Microsoft products, so convert the files you want to send to Acrobat Portable Document Format (.pdf).
    • This will eliminate the possibility of sending a virus along with the file.
    • It allows anyone—regardless of their software options—to save and view the file.
  • Instead of attaching a simple document, copy the text of it and paste it into the email message.
    • Often, the formatting will show up, as many email programs convert the text to Rich Text Format (.rtf).
  • Do not add graphics files to Word before sending them.
    • Unless the recipient can open the file in Word, they probably won't be able to see the graphic. Not all similar programs can render the image.
    • Instead, convert graphics files to .png, .gif, or .jpg before attaching them to the email.
  • Large graphics files are not appropriate for most email messages, so optimize them to make them web/email-ready.
    • Optimizing lowers the file size, dimensions, and resolution.
  • Large documents may need to be compressed so they will send faster.
    • Stuffit and Zipit are two applications that compress files.
    • Most newer systems will make and decompress these files.
  • Sets of documents can be archived together before sending to ensure the receipient receives them all at once.
    • Stuffit and Zipit are two applications that archive files.
    • Most newer systems will make and unarchive these files into a folder to keep them organized.

Reply to messages within 48 hours

As an OSU Ecampus instructor, I am expected to respond to your messages within 48 hours, therefore I expect the same from you.

If you do not hear from me within that time, more than likely the message was deleted because it looked like spam, I got bombarded with administrative emails and did not get a chance to address your question, or I'm still tracking down the solution.

Please feel free to email me again if you suspect a problem.