investment bank who—in the middle of
a merger with another bank—assembled
a spreadsheet of the merging company’s
executive compensation data and then
hit Reply to All on an e-mail intended
for only his CEO. But the classic e-mail
trap is resorting to an electronic message
in haste or anger when picking up the
phone would have been a better option.
“I had a client, a senior VP at a
tech company, who exploded to an
employee who didn’t want to move
forward with a product launch,” says
Debbie Robins, a workplace author and
columnist for The Hu;ngton Post. “He
shot o; this e-mail: ‘I really don’t care
what you think! I care what you do!
As Nike says, Just Do It!” (The actual
e-mail contained much cruder language, but you get the picture.)
One helpful tool is to add a five-minute delay on all outgoing e-mails, to
allow a cooling-o; period. Or go ahead
and write the e-mail in anger to get it
out of your system. Then save it as a
draft, walk away from your computer
for a glass of water, and read it again
with a refreshed (and hopefully less
hotheaded) state of mind before
sending. The upshot: Keep your old
business school professor’s advice
in mind at all times—don’t put in
an e-mail anything that you’d be
embarrassed to read on the company
bulletin board.
They’ll hum, eat an
apple or otherwise
make noises that
don’t belong in
a group meeting
until, inevitably,
a colleague says,
“Whoever is doing
that, use the mute
button, for crying
out loud!”
may be tempted—since they’re somewhat invisible on a conference line—to
try to hide once the complaint is made.
But it’s very likely everyone will know
it’s you anyway, so react with personal
accountability. You can salvage the situation with humor, too. Just say, ‘Sorry!
I was so busy that I didn’t have time for
lunch before the call! Won’t happen
again. Promise!’ ” You can even joke
about not understanding how the mute
button works. Next time, however, make
sure you do.
#5Mistake: You leave your ésumé on the o;ce copy machine.
It’s classic: You perceive that your future
with the company is, well, not exactly
Oops! Mistake #4: Fail to press the mute button during that all-important weekly conference call? Fess up.
#4Mistake: You forget to hit the mute button on a conference call. The phone-in, virtual conference is ubiquitous these days. Why not? It saves untold thousands of dollars in travel costs by clustering in the same “room” teams of colleagues who are physically spread from coast to coast—even if that room is only a tiny speakerphone. Unfortunately for many teleconference participants, however, failure to use the mute button can get
people in trouble. They’ll hum, eat an
apple or otherwise make noises that
don’t belong in a group meeting until,
inevitably, a colleague says, “Whoever
is doing that, use the mute button, for
crying out loud!”
If you’re the culprit here, the best
option is to fess up immediately. “Integ-
rity is everything,” Robins says. “Some
