We used to teach courses in business writing in business school. Students learned how to construct effective business letters and memorandums.
Over the past decades, those courses faded away as formal requirements in most business schools. Business schools opted to integrate writing requirements into various courses in their curricula. Students now graduate with experience in writing business case study analyses and research papers, but get little or no instruction on how to construct formal business communications.
Emails Show the Result
I see the outcomes of the lack of training in business communication in emails that I receive from students. Most students use a highly informal communication style in their emails. It starts with the salutation. “Hey, Professor”, or my least favorite, “Hey, Jeff”, are common salutations in emails I receive from students. Although this might be fine in an informal text message, email has become the new medium for business communication. Therefore, it needs a higher standard of formality and writing style.
From there, the content of the email then proceeds to go downhill. The text of the messages are full of poor grammar and language that sounds like it is pulled from a hastily constructed personal text message sent to one of their friends.
From what I hear from employers and investors, students carry this informal, unprofessional style of writing with them into their careers after college. I frequently hear from people in the business community about students and alumni of mine who send emails that are so long and rambling that they give up trying to understand the purpose of the communication. They complain about emails full of typos, muddled messages, and poor grammar.
David Cohen, an investor and founder of Techstars, wrote in a blog post that he commonly receives emails sent en masse to a large group of investors, many of whom he knows personally. At best, this shows a lack of respect for the recipients. At worst, it makes the sender look just plain lazy.
In a follow-up post, Cohen highlights what he calls “the perfect email.” The sender is clear about the purpose of the email. The sender takes the time to personalize the email to the recipient. The email is well-written with a clear and concise message.
Creating Effective Emails
If a student graduates and gets a corporate job, they will quickly get trained in effective business communication (however, these employers do wonder why it is left up to them to teach this skill).
For those pursuing a purely entrepreneurial career path, they are on their own to develop effective business communication skills. There are plenty of good resources out there (for example, here, here, and here).
By all means, find someone to proofread your important emails. If you are in a co-working space, find a group of fellow entrepreneurs who are will and able to review each others’ communications to help everyone get better. Effective business communication, like any skill, takes learning and practice.
Naturally, one would think the information articulated in this article was common sense to most students. However, as you point out, that could not be farther from the truth. As a student, the lack of formality is also evident in my communications with my peers. Perhaps, students come out of high school with bad habits and know no better than to take a similar approach in college.
However, I still don’t think a course dedicated to teaching students these skills is necessary. For a student who already contains this knowledge or is willing to adopt such formalities as they grow, a class of that sort would feel like busy work and a waste of money. This isn’t to say training in this isn’t valuable. Instead, maybe professors can emphasize the necessity of this fundamental skill more often and at the very least provide some informative youtube videos to help students grow these skills.
I can attest to the lack of professionalism in emails from my generation. I do believe that is partly a result of it not being emphasized in classes, or having a specific class, like we used to. However, it should be a common practice for all those who strive to be business professionals one day. On a similar note, if I am able to set myself apart from my peers through the way I email, then I will make it a point to communicate professionally and efficiently through every email.
I agree that this professional communication is lacking. I believe that one of the best ways to improve these communication skills is to practice in simple and small ways. Learning how to communicate concisely in a simple email will help students and professionals with their communication skills in their everyday lives with fellow peers, co-workers, or employers. I have found that in practicing these skills over email (or other professional communication outlets such as Slack), my verbal communication skills have improved. This improvement will be helpful in future presentations, interviews, and even in everyday conversations with others.
This post reinforces a message I have heard countless times. Through repetition, it has made a difference in my approach. I have overheard leaders of various businesses discussing their frustration related to their new, young hires because of their informal communication style. One thing seems clear; demographics shape this. Understanding your customer (or employee) takes on a whole new dimension. There may be more than one right way going forward.
Business communication is is such an undervalued skill in college. This generation of students is so used to speed and efficiency. Many times this structure can come at cost of personal greetings or well-written writing. This is how we are used to communicating with our peers, so students don’t know anything different. “The Perfect Email” blog post was a helpful resource that outlined the components of a proper email. We would all be better prepared for corporate jobs if more students were exposed to this.
Drafting effective and concise emails is very important because effective business communication is key for good communication. Poor communication can cause so many issues that can be prevented simply by proof reading or knowing how to write a proper email.
Personally, I know most of our generations has lack of professionalism in emails, the way they present themselves throughout the email. That’s the one thing I always learnt from my highschool career is how to form an email to be respectful and also to earn the respect of your professor. Even during our lack communication skills as this generations leads through their phones, I mean you see it on campus where everyone is walking with their head down glued to the phone; which is a lack of social ques and communications which to me needs to improve even for the generations below us to learn from.
This is such an important message in our day and age. Our generation is so used to texting that trying to send a formal email seems daunting. I personally find it hard to strike a balance between being formal and still being human in my messages. I believe that it would be very advantageous to have a business writing class in order to better hone our writing skills in the workplace.
Although we are not a business society that uses suits and ties in the work environment as much anymore, there is still an ample amount of professionalism that should be had in the professional world. I would agree that informality is sometimes appropriate, more often than not, students and young professionals are poorly trained on how to be formal/professional. I think effective and efficient communication should be taught and is something that I am still working on. I need to take out the fluff.
While I don’t claim to be perfect, this sore point is something that I have sought to avoid during all of my college career. Every time I write an email, no matter the occasion or recipient, it almost always ends up sounding incredibly formal – even if it is to one of my on-campus bosses who prefers I call them by their first name. I know that actual business related emails will be even another step up from the level I am writing at right now, but I hope that by not getting lazy during college, I won’t be as far from the goal as I could be. And hopefully I won’t have to have as much training as some other students might have to. All that said, I would have absolutely appreciated a course at some point in my college career that truly highlighted the importance of a well-written email, and not in a cheesy way like some of those “life-lesson” classes are taught.
I don’t think there is a lack in email communication skills. If anyone emails you “Hey Professor” it’s because you conduct your classroom in a manner that allows students to believe this is ok. Every company is different and has different standards. I don’t think it is unreasonable to explain those standards to a new employee. Most students graduating college have the ability to read the room and know how to write and address an email.