

Emails need to be refactored  - jakep36

I just read a long winded email from a colleague.  I had to read it several times and still had trouble extracting "the point".  A long three paragraph email could be boiled down to four short bullet points.  It occurred to me that as a programmer, I may be more susceptible to frustration.  I spend all day trying to avoid this in code.  Do you re-factor your emails before sending?  How do you deal with others that don't?
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r7000
All good writing has been 'refactored' as you put it. Except writers call it
'editing', 'polishing' and 'rewriting'.

And just like excellent code when you see some great writing you tend to think
'that looks amazingly simple!' but when you attempt to produce the same sort
of elegance it somehow isn't so easy!

How to deal with it: accept you can't change the world, move into a position
where you have the freedom to ignore e-mails when you like, get good at
scanning!

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wallflower
Yes, I refactor emails. Iteration. I find the more time you take to compose an
email, the better and more coherent the end product. Especially true when
sending an email a client.

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noodle
you could say the same about any form of communication. some people just don't
know how to communicate ideas effectively, whether it is via email, essay,
phone call, conversation, twit, et al.

i do my best, when i'm about to communicate an idea in any form, to condense,
polish, and qualitatively validate the idea/message/whatever before i actually
communicate it, whether that means actually verbally saying the words, or
hitting send on the email. not everyone will understand my internal dialog.
you have to translate your thoughts into a real-world message before it gets
sent.

dealing with others that don't? ask questions and take notes if you have to.
other than that, you just have to adapt to understanding other people's brain
dumps if they can't filter them on their own. look for topic sentences and
latch onto them.

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raju
If I had more time, I would have written a shorter letter - T.S Eliot

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edw519
Never really thought about it, but OP brings up an interesting point,
especially for specialized apps.

Hmmm, instead of typing out free form text, just click on certain verbs,
adjectives, and nouns to get across your point. Kinda like xml for humans. The
possibilities are endless.

