Respond to two (2) Colleagues D1W5

Reflection and Shared Practice

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I have received not less than 50 emails this week alone without counting spam mails. The number combines personal, professional, and academic emails, meaning they have varying degrees of importance. I tend to give top priority to professional emails when responding to my emails. This is because professional emails tend to have some urgency and important information that I would not want to miss or find late. Academic emails are also important but not as urgent, mainly because I have learned about their timings and that they are mostly about assignments. Lastly, I consider personal emails as the least important due to the available option of giving me a call when the information is urgent. Therefore, choosing the email option only means that the matter is not time sensitive. On the other hand, I have originated about 20 emails this week, including personal, professional, and academic emails.

One email exchange that is of particular interest was a professional one that I received regarding a time-sensitive project. The team had agreed on the time to deliver the project, but the email contained information that the client had reduced the duration for its completion. Therefore, this was additional pressure because we already had limited time to work on a demanding project, and that time had just been cut further.

When I received this email, I immediately felt vexed with its contents. The email was in the form of a request and contained adequate information, which gave it a professional tone. At the same time, it had a good structure and a clear message, making it faultless in a professional context. The only problem was that it was not the most suitable communication medium to relay such information, especially when the team was used to holding face-to-face meetings when discussing issues concerning the project. In other words, an email was not the best medium, considering the nature and purpose of the information that was being relayed.

As a result, my reaction when I read the email was pure frustration. This was due to the feeling that the sender, who was part of the project, was avoiding the unpleasantness of relaying this message face-to-face, a factor that is common with most electronic communication mediums (Quintanilla & Wahl, 2020). Hence, the audience of the message was appropriate, the purpose was right, but the medium was not the best, given our previous experiences with how such information was relayed.

Since the email was the only option, I worked on an efficient and professional way to respond to the message despite my frustration. In my response, I asked about the way forward, to which the sender replied that the team should meet to discuss the matter. When the team met, the frustrations were minimal as they had come to terms with the state of affairs. However, my interpretation of this calmness during the meeting was that members of the team were experiencing interaction supportiveness, where they paid more attention to how the team leader was relaying the information than what was actually being communicated (Robertson, 2005).

The primary purpose of the email was to communicate operational information about the project the team was engaged in. The message was necessary, but the only concern was about the medium used. Nonetheless, it is worth stating that the initiator of the communication did not fully achieve his purpose for relaying the information because the team had to meet to chart a way forward. On the other hand, I achieved my purpose because more details about the changes in the project’s timelines were provided during the meeting. The team also designed strategies to meet the requirements. Regardless, the outcome of the communication was not as effective because the initiator of the communication did not achieve his objective of relaying the information, leading to a follow-up meeting. Since I maintained professionalism during the whole email exchange, there is not much I would do differently given the opportunity to re-do, except try to be more empathic with the team leader since it was not his fault the deadline for the project was revised. However, the whole exchange confirmed that people are always starving for the kind of information that leads to shared meaning and understanding (Robertson, 2005).  

Robertson, E. (2005). Placing leaders at the heart of organizational communication. Strategic

Communication Management, 9(5), 34–37.

Quintanilla, K. M., & Wahl, S. T. (2020). Business and professional communication: KEYS for workplace

excellence (4th ed.) Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.

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2nd Colleague – Douglas

Douglas Hayes

Reflection and Shared Practice

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Most of the emails that I receive are spam in my email, which I do not reply to. I think I receive about 500-700 emails a week. The emails that I do reply to are of a professional manner, doctor's communication, or school-related. When I was working, finding professionally responding to emails was essential. I have noticed that educators are people that work best in a personable manner. However, my last job was on that line between educators and the business world. These are two different worlds that communicate differently. Business people like to email me at all hours and need a response that day. At the same time, educators were more relaxed and were more face-to-face communication. I had to worry about burnout with the business people. A symptom of burnout could be "unresolved personal conflicts, beyond the job situation, such as marital tensions, chronic health problems, or financial problems" (Quintanilla, pg 353). Mine was, unfortunately, health problems that caused me to develop seizures and tremors. Doctors' notes can be tricky to respond to. Sometimes I want to respond to them with anger and dissent because of their answer to my inquiry. However, I have noticed that when I do this, they shut down and move even slower. I have to respond with kindness, but I also put in the email what I need to get to different agencies and what time they need to be done.

I can remember the email from my primary physician to get my letter for disability services. I usually communicate to them as a personal email, but I changed it to a professional manner for the email. This is because we had multiple conversations about me getting this letter and his refusal to give that to me. Some background about this letter is that I have epilepsy seizures that have prevented me from working the last couple of months. We were going through Kiser, and I talked to my primary doctor which should be centralizing my care. The email conversation started by asking for a letter to services. He responded that he did not know my case and that I would be forced to talk to another doctor. This caused the email to get heated; however, I had to create the emails more perfectional manner. Professional emails are more focused on their message. This seems to have an impact but still did not do the job. I had to send my emails to his supervisor to get my letter, but I did not change the format. This did get me the letter, and I am now on disability. If I knew that the primary doctor was not following my case in the first place, I would have started with a professional email instead of a personal one.

Finding the audience in an email can be tricky. Even when I was working, I worked in early childhood, and we all addressed each other as friends. However, we are in a professional environment, and we have a job to do. I have also struggled with doctors emails because I treat them in a personal manner, but it is a professional relationship." The first step is to put yourself in the shoes of your audience. What do they need to know, and what do they know already? And what would they want to hear?" (Mind Tools, 2018) Another step is how to communicate. I like to communicate with my peers through face-to-face communication. The more I progress through my career, this form of communication is slow and not possible in the fast-paced world that we now live in.

Reference:

Mind Tools. (2018). Communication planning: Getting the right message across in the right way. Retrieved from https:// www. Mindtools.com/CommSkll/CommunicationsPlanning.htm?route=Article/Communicationplanning.htm

Quintanilla, K. M., & Wahl, S. T. (2020). Business and Professional Communication (4th ed.). Sage publishing Ltd.

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