For example I’ll send an e-mail with 3 questions and will only get an answer to one of the questions. It’s worse when there are 2 yes/no questions with a question that is obviously not a yes/no question. Then I get a response of
Yes
back in the e-mail. So which question are they answering?
Mainly I’m asking all of you why do people insist on only answering 1 question out of an e-mail where there are multiple? Do people just not read? Are people that lazy? What is going on?
Edit at this point I’ve got the answers . Some are too lazy to actually read. Some admit they get focused on one item and forget to go back. I understand the second group. The first group yeah no excuse there.
Continuing edit: there are comments where people have tried the bullet points and they say it still doesn’t help. I might put the needed questions in red.
Few people can focus enough to read.
I work in a technical field. In the past few years I’ve learned that interacting by email usually requires one-line sentences or bullet points, with any questions being numbered. No fluff, no secondary thoughts or possibilities. Keep it as minimal as possible.
It still fails to elicit a coherent response about half the time, but it’s the best I’ve found so far.
It didn’t use to be like this. But what’s to blame; screen addiction, microplastics, covid, increased stress, … ?
I don’t disagree it’s a focus thing for many people. I’m often stunned at the lack of comprehension or attention to detail using any medium, even in person (also technical field).
Like look, I just said to do what you’re asking would require 250 firewall rules…why are you now talking as if firewall rules aren’t required? I even went through the simplest math out loud during this meeting, so everyone would understand how I came up with that number and didn’t just pull it out of my ass.
People pay attention to what they want to pay attention to (or as my grandfather would say - people hear what they want to hear). If those questions aren’t a high priority for their own work, they simply don’t see them.
For OP: email is a terrible medium for such things, unless there’s been a conversation about it, and this is part of moving a project forward. Anything out of left field isn’t important to your audience, and… people dislike comitting to anything in email. As you work with people up the food chain, you’ll find less and less happens via verifiable comms like email (which is archived).
Everyone should be required to take Plain Language writing courses.
There’s a lot of factors at play as to why more people prefer it now, but who cares really. Writing in plain language makes it accessible for everyone and doesn’t hurt anyone.
Yes. If you’re going to add context, it better be after your main point or main question. Most people just want to know what you’re ultimately trying to convey and will not read the entire thing.