M-DCC Email Etiquette 11/28/00
every day.1. Be nice. You are using a computer, not talking to one. Say hello at the start of your message and goodbye at the end.
2. Use MS Word to send official college email messages within the College. Notify Campus Network Services if your computer does not have a working copy of Word.
3. Use your spell checker and grammar checker before sending an email message.
4. Words and text typed in capital letters are considered impolite. They are interpreted as yelling or shouting.
5. Always include a subject line in your message. If a message is important enough to send, then it should include a subject line to help the recipient prioritize its importance.
6. Do not include a physical representation of your signature in your email message. It can be cut and then pasted in a message that you did not originate.
7. Be sensitive when writing email messages. The person to whom you are writing may not share your values or cultural background. If you offend someone, apologize immediately. It doesn’t cost anything and keeps the peace.
8. Don’t take offense easily when reading email messages. People are often more uninhibited than usual when communicating via email. However, if someone sends you a threatening email message, do not delete it. Show it to your supervisor and if necessary notify campus security immediately.
9. Do not send an email message that would embarrass you and/or the College if it were published in the Miami Herald.
10. Never forward a message unless you know it is true, especially email virus alerts. College network personnel subscribe to national and international virus alert services. They will know about a virus long before you do.
11. College Procedure prohibits sending email chain letters, advertisements for pyramid schemes and other forms of spam. Do not forward them to your colleagues.
12. Not every email requires a response, but if you get an email from someone outside the College, you should respond quickly.
13. For email messages that do require a response, send an answer as quickly as possible--one or two workdays is usually acceptable.
14. If you are unsure if your email recipient’s system can recognize fancy formatting, do not include it in your message. What may appear as bold and italicized words in your email may actually be punctuated with slashes and brackets used in mark up language in your recipients system.
15. If special formatting is not necessary in a document that is to be sent via email, send the document as plain text in the body of the message instead of as an attachment.
16. Multi-forwarded mail is an unnecessary use of bandwidth. When forwarding email (if you must), you should remove headers from previous mailings, including the email addresses if any.
17. When responding to a specific part of an email message, include just that section of the original email message and delete the rest from your reply. Be sure to leave the quoted section intact with your reply since it can be confusing to read a response and not be able to see exactly what you originally wrote.
18. "Reply All" is sensitive email function. Be cautious and use it sparingly. Do not continue to include people in an email response if the message becomes a private conversation.
19. When sending information to more than several recipients that you do not want to be able to "Reply" to anyone but you, place all the recipients email addresses in a blind carbon copy field ( BCC) and place your own email address in the "To" field.
20. Do not assume that other people you know want to read all the great stories that you receive in your in-box. Occasionally, you may encounter a really special anecdote that you might want to share with someone, but not with all your acquaintances, and certainly not
21. Consult "Preventing Online Clutter" on the College CTD page http://www.mdc.edu/ctd/train/outlook/overlimit.htm for more information about the following Email guidelines:
a. Empty your Deleted Items box regularly.
b. Empty your Sent Items Folder regularly.
c. Delete large messages, especially ones with attachments.
d. Archive messages that you must keep.
e. Know how much storage space you have left.
Contributed by Jackie Zellman - Vice Provost - Communication, Computers and Information Resources
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