Out-of-office and out-of-mind?
Image: Daniel von Appen on Unsplash
With many businesses closing over the holiday period, many of us will be setting up an automated email to let people know that we’re out-of-office. You wouldn’t want this email to make people think you weren’t serious about your job, would you?
I understand that the stereotype of an editor is an angry pedant crossing things out with a red pen. I’m not the sort of person who goes around rubbing errant apostrophes off the blackboards at greengrocers (think ‘apple’s $3 a kilo’). But when I see an obvious spelling or grammatical error in someone’s email signature or out-of-office reply, I tend to reach out to let them know. Because I hope someone would do the same for me.
These days, an email is often the first interaction you have with a prospective client or supplier. In some Red Pony projects, all our correspondence with the client takes place over email. Organisations go to a lot of trouble to make sure that anything they publish – whether it is a report, letterhead or business card – is a professional representation of their brand. An email signature should be the same.
And yet, because they are usually the last thing we do before going on leave, out-of-office emails often don’t receive the care and attention they deserve.
So, as with any other business communication, consider applying some simple strategies to avoid little mistakes creeping in:
After drafting the text, leave it for a few minutes before re-reading so you can review it with fresh eyes.
Ask a colleague to have a quick read over it for you.
Use a ‘template’ (your organisation may already have one) with standard text where you just need to adjust the dates.
The text of an out-of-office email can be very formal (for example, ‘I am on leave from 24 December 2024 until 20 January 2025. If your matter is urgent, please contact my colleague Jenny on etc, etc.’), or it might be lighter and more playful – so long as it still reflects the tone of the organisation brand.
Finally, don’t forget to turn it off on your return to work. Telling someone you can’t respond to their email because you’re on holidays for all of January won’t cut it when they’ve emailed you in February.
