Whenever I get a long email, I always reply saying something like this…
Thanks for this.
I’m hectic today. Very quickly, please can you confirm what you want me to do with this info?
The Sender’s reply always helps me speed-up my reply
- For example, if they say “It was just FYI”, I might skim-read it (or I’ll just drag it into my special “FYI folder”!)
- Or if they say “Just look at page 3, and tell me your thoughts”… Well, I now just look at page 3, then tell them my thoughts
I don’t do this with every long email, of course. But I do it with the vast majority of them. And this saves me loads of time.
And, because I can now reply quicker, it also saves the Sender loads of time.
Worth a try?
Action Point
When it’s appropriate, reply to a long email with my response. And see how it helps you.
(And for those emails where it is not appropriate, just suck it up and read the whole thing.)