One of my favorite Oracle Bloggers, Floyd Teter often uses Rock Lyrics quotes to open his posts. I’ve blogged before about email management (26,138 Emails in My Inbox (and I feel fine) using a play on an REM song, but I thought I’d be a little more upscale today and go with Shakespear.
I decided to write this post in response to a post on the Talented Apps blog, by Sri Subramanian discussing how we process lots of information from feeds, twitter and emails and mentioning that adding people to the cc: on an email is ok as long as the subject is good so they can filter. I disagree. There is a very big difference between email and feeds (RSS, twitter, facebook feed, blogs etc), one is like me going to a bookstore and browsing and the other is like junk mail, let’s compare the two.
Junk mail – somebody gets my address and specifically sends a message to me and it is delivered right to my door and I have to look at it and chuck into the recycle bin that I keep close to where I pick up my mail. If I don’t like something I’m sent, I cannot easily stop them sending more.
Bookstore – I look around for a bookstore I like the look of and I go in and navigate to the sections of interest and look around maybe thumb through a few, maybe buy some and read them fully, or not. I decide when I leave and if I go back there again.
In summary the difference is that email (or junk snail mail) is not on my terms. I opt in to feeds (or bookstores) and I can opt out whenever I like, but email I have no choice it comes to my inbox and I have to deal with it. I can set up filters, but that is error prone because I may filter something that I need and miss it.
I love feeds and information flowing from them are great, because it is on my terms but I think people sending emails have some responsibility to attempt to cc: only people that need to know.
What’s your opinion on the topic, is it ok to cc: everyone on your mail, just in case they are interested? Let me know in the comments section.
photo credit: StreetAlbum
http://www.flickr.com/photos/streetalbum/3102886548/in/photostream/
[The RISA mentioned in the photo is a company that paints over graffiti – some say it is cleaning up, some say it is destroying street art]
Enterprise Applications by David Haimes 
It is really hard to decide if you want to cc someone just cz they might be interested. it is actually a hard decision. Whille in the corporate world cc is used as the cya tool so that the boss doesnt saythey didtn get it but it is a really hard decision. Often times you actually start ignoring a person just because they cc you so many times that the information becomes junk.
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It is very hard to know who to cc: or when to prune people from the cc:, which is why people don’t do it maybe
As for the cya by adding the boss to the cc: I think your boss will appreciate it more if you cc: him when it is of interest or importance to him and not for things you cna handle without him.
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David,
Sorry for not responding earlier. I was traveling when you wrote this, and have been in catch up mode since.
I am not sure if there is a disagreement, or if we may be saying the same thing. Clearly, we both don’t want junk emails – with jokes, promotions, etc.
The question is do you Cc more people or less on informational email at work, or send it only to those who need to know. I (as a recipient) would rather *I* made the decision if some information is important to me. I find that not being in the loop, and thus not being able to contribute at a higher level, is a bigger problem than getting too many emails about a new customer, an escalation, a meeting, etc. – even if it does not directly relate to me. Certainly, RSS feeds and beehive collab are great for structured data (like ongoing projects), but does not cover a lot of ad hoc information that floats around in emails.
I appreciate when people do not want to be sent emails unless there is any action required, and I respect that. However, I start with assuming the other way, and Cc my peers, my manager, and my staff on a lot of information that does not require any action from them. I do call out action items, so it is clear when I do need something from them.
If you and I were to work in the same team, I would like you to send me more information, and not worry about whether it is useful to me. I would be happy to do the same, or to prune you from email, as per your preference.
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I don’t like my team to cc: me on everything, it is noise and I don’t know when to read and when not to, I trust them to have conversations without me listening and I trust them to know when to bring me into a conversation or better still give me a summary when a conclusion is reached.
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