Have you ever thought about the word “dictator”? What does “dictator “mean? Throughout history, dictators have ruled countries and nations; some more extravagant and brutal than others. What is “dictation”? When was the last time you used that word? Let me give you a hint…Remember your English teacher from your elementary school days? As an ESLer (i.e. English Second Language), your English teacher gave you some English dictations, remember? Your teacher spoke out words like “school”, “classroom” and “language” and you wrote down the words as they were spoken. Now, what does that have to do with our business emails, you ask? Please keep reading.
In each and every one of us lies this tiny dictator, just waiting to get out in our business emails. How many times have you used “I need”, “I have to”, “I want”, “I must”, “I should” in your emails? One hundred; two hundred; one thousand times? What happens when you’re using these modal verbs of necessity? You are actually dictating the action, just like the dictator forcefully dictates his policies on his people. Would you want others to dictate actions to you? Some clients of mine often tell me that they have stopped using “I need”, “I want”, “I have to”, “I must”, “I should” and switched to “We need”, “We want”, “We have to”, “We must”, “We should”, which actually serves as the same thing in disguise. It’s quite ironic but some people think that by using “we” and not “I”, you are actually shifting the strong “dictation” approach from the individual to others, and by doing so, you are able to free yourself from any binding responsibility.
For example: “I need to talk to you about the project” sounds much harsher than “We need to talk to you about the project” – don’t you think so? Still, both are displaying a bit of a forceful approach, and it’s better if you replace them.
When you are done writing your business email, just before you click on “send”, review it once again, and if you suddenly see that you had used in your text, one of the above modal verbs of necessity, delete it and replace it with one of these wonderful alternatives:
- I would like to…
- I would greatly appreciate if you could please…
- Could/Would you please…?
- Could/Would you kindly…?
- I would be grateful if you could please…
Sounds better, doesn’t it? Happy FormaTexting…