FIFTH LESSON ENGLISH B2

UPPER INTERMEDIATE
(SECOND SEMESTER)
EMAILING
How many emails do you receive a day? Do you think you could
now live without email at work?
Do you think we can understand how successful a person is from
the way he/she is writing? What do you think about
sloppy/careless emails?

The beautiful part of writing is that you don’t have to get it

right the first time, unlike, say, a brain surgeon. You can
always do it better.
A) according to the Electronic Messaging Association, around seven trillion emails
are sent annually. How many of them end up in your inbox? And how do you deal
with the following problems?
When everybody has email and anybody can send you email, how do you decide
whose messages you’re going to read and respond to first and whose you are going to
send to the trash unread? Tom Peters in Fast Company magazine

B) is email a time-saver or does it distract you from more important business? Are
you anything like the typical workers mentioned below?
As Clive Thompson pointed out in The New York Times Magazine, after a worker has
been interrupted with a message, it generally takes nearly half an hour for him to return
to his original task. According to researchers, 40% of workers moved on to completely
new tasks after being interrupted, leaving their old task behind, neglected and
unfinished. SEND, The Essential Guide to Email for Office and Home

C) are you ignoring your email more these days? Does this company’s idea sound
like it could work?

Signs are that the first rush of enthusiasm for email may be waning. One big company
in the computing industry is considering banning emails in the afternoon. It found that
its people had stopped talking to one another. Stuart Crainer in A Freethinker’s A-Z of
the New World of Business
D) Have you ever sent an angry email or hidden behind an email when you had
bad news to deliver? How do you feel about the advice below?

Rule number one: never send an email when you are mad. And if you want to know
if you’re mad, just take two fingers, close your eyes and touch your eyelids. If
they’re hot, researchers say you’re mad and you should put it in the draft pile and
send it later. One of the things I’ve learned is that email is for saying ‘yes’, email is
for answering or asking questions. If you say ‘no’, if you criticize, if you attack,
please, do it in person – or, worst case, do it over the phone. Tim Sanders, Better Life
Media

E) the Institute of Management puts working with computers amongst ‘The

Top Ten Stress Factors at Work’. Have you ever resorted to any of the
following?

A survey by Mori reveals that three quarters of computer users shout and swear at
their machines. A similar study by IT support company Sosmatic shows that 43% of
them have slapped, smacked and even kicked their computer. The mouse is the most
abused piece of equipment, receiving 31.5% of the punishment, followed by the
monitor, the printer, the hard drive and the keyboard. Over a year such outbursts of
‘computer rage’can cost companies up to £25,000 in lost earnings and damaged
hardware.
What are the pros and cons of rewriting an email?
Do you agree that emails are like a ‘speech-writing?’ Sometimes it
is not necessary to pay attention to the accuracy.
Read the following article. Is it easy to understand?

Aoccdring to receearh at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn’t mttaer in

what oredr the ltteers in a wrod are. The olny iprmoatnt tihng us taht
the frist ltteres are in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and
you can sltil raed it wouthit a porbelm. This is bcuseae the huamn
mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but a wrod as a wlohe.
Listen to a podcast explaining what kind of email you send says
about your career prospects. Match the person to the email type.

A high-flyer 1 reply to all

B born leader 2 filled with emoticons
C corporate loser 3 prefer face mail
D time-waster 4 bcc to boss
E poor team player 5 neatly paragraphed
F office joker 6 short phrases
Professor Owens explains that the sloppier the email is, the more
likely the writer is successful. According to the podcast, badly
written emails are a sign of leadership potential because they tend
to be written by high status employees with little time to spend on
writing perfect emails. Well- written emails are a sign of a
corporate loser – someone who has too much time to spend
writing emails. Using emoticons means people won’t take you
seriously.
Do you agree?
What makes emails effective?
• Are focused on the recipient.
• Arouse attention before they're opened.
• Are kind and respectful.
• Are written with correct spelling and grammar.
• Make the recipient feel good.
• Leave little or no room for interpretation
• Are as long as they need to be, and no longer.
• Have a clear call to action.
How you write an email largely depends on who are you writing
to. If you are writing to a business contract for the first time or
you don’t know the person, a formal style is generally used.
Read the following email and underline the best option. This is
the first time Simon Allen has contacted Timothy Green.
Dear (1)Timothy Green/Mr Green,
(2)I hope everything’s fine/ I trust you are well.
(3)I would like to congratulate you on an excellent presentation / Just to say you did a
fantastic presentation. The product demonstration was extremely(4) well received /
went down really well.
However, (5)I’ll tell you something I really didn’t like/ there is one aspect which
concerns me. As it stands, the packaging design (6) may be problematic / would really
cause a lot of problems. (7)How about changing the design? / would you consider
changing the design?(8) Let’s meet next week and see what other ideas we can come
up with / could we meet next week to discuss some alternative ideas?
(9) BTW, I need you to take a look at the Singapore report. / Also, I would be grateful
if you could read over the Singapore report. In particular is rather urgent to get the cost
breakdown figures from the report. Would it be possible for you to(10) provide me the
information by Wednesday 10 am? / send me the cost breakdown from the report
ASAP?
(11) For any questions don’t hesitate to contact Sandra Taylor in accounts./ Should
you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact Sandra Taylor in accounts.
(12) Your sincerely/ Best regards
Simon Allen
Director of Marketing
USEFUL PUNCTUATION:
• Comma ,
• Full stop .
• Semicolon ;
• Colon :
• Capital letter A
• Underscore _
• Dash -
• Bracket (
• Question mark ?
• Lower case letter a
Email blunders
What kind of things do people use their office computers for which are
not strictly business? Have you ever been tempted to do anything it was
not strictly related to business?
Have you ever sent an email and later regretted it? How dangerous is it to
send business emails (even internally) without considering the possible
implications?
How tolerant is your company of the personal use of computers? Is it
considered a perk? Some companies allow workers some personal use
each day – is this a good solution to the problem?
What other inappropriate material could be circulated via email?
(company gossip, intimate messages between people who are in a
relationship and who are also colleagues, etc…)
Listen to the story of some of the biggest email blunders ever
made and number the following in order they are mentioned.

Netscape Merrill Lynch

Dow Chemical Cerner
The Love Bug Western Provident
AOL Norwich Union
Microsoft
Answer to the following questions

1.How much the Love Bug cost computer networks worldwide?

2.How much the two insurance companies settled out the court for?
3.How many people lost their jobs at Dow Chemical?
4.Whose shock fell by 28%?
5.How much Merrill Lynch had to pay out because of Blodget’s email?
6.Which executives regretted sending emails in the Microsoft antitrust
trial?
Homework: write a short email in reply to the one we analyzed
before; remember to use an appropriate style and to divide it
into paragraphs. You can use the prompts below.

Glad/ enjoyed/ presentation/also pleased/response/product demo//

disappointed/hear/not keen/design//thought/quite stylish//
let/know/free/discuss/alternatives//around/most/next week//happy/
go through / report/ costing / ready / within /few days// may need/
check/ few things/ Sandra// happen /have/ extension number?/
thanks