A Cautionary Tale: Watch the Email

Dr. Bruce Kone of the University of Florida was involved in a controversy this Spring about (allegedly) inappropriate inactions involving the admission of a student.  There is a lot of finger-pointing going on in this story, but two facts are pretty clear.  First, as part of the controversy, then Dean Kone sent a rather nasty email to several Florida administrators, that led to a public apology on his part.  Second, Dr. Kone was removed as Dean of the Medical School shortly thereafter. 

It is unclear if Dr. Kone lost his job just because of the email, there were a lot of other things going on (he did seem to have overly close personal connections to the student he admitted and there are some hints from the news stories that he was breeding a climate of fear at the school). But I confess that, for me, this story had special resonance as I think I am most prone toward becoming temporary asshole on email, and have learned -- the hard way -- to keep censoring myself.  An IT guy I know showed me that he has his email set-up so that it takes a full five minutes for his email to go out after he hits "send." I think I will go in and set that up.  Also, another part of this story we should all remember -- many, or perhaps most, of our employers have can go back and read the emails we send.  

Finally, alas, I don't find the nastiness here very surprising, as academia, and especially, medicine have well-deserved reputations for being prone to asshole poisoning, and here we have both worlds at work -- although some doctors are fighting back admirably.

Comments

[Kevin Rutkowski]

James Drogan mentioned that you shouldn't put anything in an e-mail that you wouldn't want read in court. Let's add that you shouldn't put anything that you wouldn't want in the New York Times.

The CEO of Countrywide accidentally included a customer on an e-mail recently. It ended up in the New York Times business section on Sunday.

Here's a link to the article that I read on Sunday: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/13/business/13mail.html

Apparently, this is at least the second time that this e-mail resulted in a New York Times article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/25/business/25suits.html

[Hypnosis Melbourne]

Yeah I know many occassion where I've caught myself writing a "heated" reply before having a sense of caution hit me and quickly rewriting in a more social manner :)

[Chip Overclock]

Some of the best advice I've ever gotten came from someone a quarter of a century ago in the very early days of email: before you press send, go to the bathroom. It's amazing how a few moments of reflection, and an empty bladder, will change your mind about what you've written.

[James Drogan]

Drogan's Third Law: Never put things in an e-mail you would not like to hear read in court.

[Al Sargent]

Hey Bob,

Long time not talk, and great to see you blogging!

I think that delayed transmission of email is a great idea and added it to the Gmail suggested features list: http://groups.google.com/group/gmail-labs-suggest-a-labs-feature/browse_thread/thread/fae9b64a6fc04bc4#

- Al

[Kevin Rutkowski]

I've learned a few things about e-mail through the years.

1) If I'm angry when I write an e-mail, the reader can sense my feelings regardless of how carefully I think I've crafted the e-mail.

2) E-mails get forwarded. Items in long e-mail chains are especially prone to being forwarded to the wrong person.

3) E-mails are evidence in trials.

4) People accidentally hit "Reply All" when they really intended their reply for one person.

I have found that it's a best practice to not respond via e-mail to an e-mail that upsets me. A phone call or in-person meeting is much better at settling a tense situation.

I also write my e-mails assuming that they will be read by anyone and everyone, especially those who are not intended to read them.

Finally, when forwarding a long e-mail chain to a new person, I delete everything except for the relevant messages.