Interpersonal Communication How Can Email Communication Affect

Interpersonal Communication

How Can Email Communication Affect Your Business? Ed. Chris McClean: Internet Consultant. Pertinent Information: Interpersonal Communication Articles. March 28, 2004. 28 Mar. 2004 http://www.pertinent.com/articles/communication/chrisCom1.asp.

In his interpersonal communication article "How Can Email Communication Affect Your Business?" Chris McClean attempts to help current and potential business owners, business partners, employees and customers to be careful in how they use or abuse email. McClean shares a personal anecdote about how he once almost made a negative assumption about an entire business entity based solely on a response from that organization to an email he had sent to them. Conveniently, the story in the article has a happy ending because both he and the company rectified the situation by sending apologetic emails to each other. However, McClean does point out that there are those individuals who are out there in cyber land that may not use an apology to 'right' a misrepresented or negatively interpreted email situation. Mclean also uses the article to show that business people using email may be limited in how they can interject personal feelings into electronic messages. One solution he proposes is to use "emoticons" to make email messaging more like face-to-face communication. Overall, the interpersonal communication article is an attempt to project his opinion of how email can be both good and bad for a business's image.

McClean appears to be trying to help the business community through the use of this article available on the internet for free. Although the internet is a wide open sea of information aimed at no one and everyone, this particular article appears to have a specific audience because it is directed towards those in the business community. "Email is now one of the fastest ways to gain or lose potential customers because of its ability to deliver information fast to an enormous amount of people." (Mclean, Chris) McClean implies that business emails have the potential to be both positive and negative. This entails that anyone writing a business related email or may be replying to a received business related email should take into consideration the potential for harming the overall opinion or image of a company receiving those emails.

The article points out that a company could suffer repercussions when sending out email that may offend. Although McClean is very clear to point out that he is not a potential hacker, he makes reference to those in the cyber world who once offended may retaliate to some perceived insult by hacking or destroying a company's web site. "Be careful, there are many vindictive people who will reply to brashness by breaking into your entire site and demonstrating how angry they are with you. I cannot and will not try to break into someone's website, but people who are more knowledgeable can and do." (Mclean, Chris) Mclean feels that the corporate image is so important on the internet that he provides internet sites that can help a company discover how the world may feel about a particular company.

One point Mclean is attempting to make throughout the article is how email has become the internets word of mouth. Therefore, business email writers should make an attempt to make emails more people friendly. McClean explains how, in his opinion, email has the ability to reach potential business partners, employees, and customers similar to the phenomena of 'word of mouth advertising.' "However, the lack of body language, tones of voice, and shared environment, email is not as rich a communication method as a telephone conversation or face-to-face. It may be difficult for your correspondent to tell if you are serious or kidding, frustrated or euphoric, happy or sad. Sarcasm has the most potential to offend and can be particularly dangerous to use in email. Avoid sending email that might be upsetting to the recipient." (Mclean, Chris) By adding "emoticons," McClean implies that email will be more easily understood and maybe more importantly, less likely to be misunderstood. The article goes on to provide actual examples of "emoticons" and also instructions for finding additional sources.

Critical Review:

This type of article is interchangeable for business and personal use. I personally think that McClean makes a few assumptions that may or may not be accurate. "On the Internet word travels fast. It takes me 3 minutes to send email to 50-100 people. Therefore your company can lose 100 current or potential customers with the brash email sent out by your employee." (Mclean, Chris)