The Effect of E-mail on Common Business Courtesy

After browsing through various posts on the internet and taking a glimpse at a few business magazines, I discovered that I might be the only person who believes in the power of utilizing e-mail in the workplace.

I presently work in a small law office in Vermont, and we have to uphold continuous correspondence with other firms in and out of state. As a small company with a great deal of business pouring in daily, we are proficient at prioritizing. We know who needs to be taken care of when, and have giant databases full of calendared events to keep the ship running smoothly. Additionally, we take care to maintain frequent contact with our clients, co-counsel and insurance carriers. What we have to take into consideration is that while our customers want the best and most personal service we can provide them, they aren't looking for someone to jump down their throat.

By law, we must copy all pertinent correspondence to the counsel and clients during the entire duration of their case, so they're already receiving mounds of mail from us through the U.S. Postal Service. And per their agreement with our firm, they receive paper bills from us that must be paid by check so that means paying for postage to send a copy of that bill with their payment back to us via snail mail as well. The least we can do is give them one less piece of paper to file away by shooting them an e-mail (copied to all counsel, of course) when we have a quick question that we still need documented proof of. This way, they don't need to do anything but hit reply, and we can take care of the rest. We have our documented proof of the conversation, and they didn't have to lose any time out of their day to do it. And let's be honest here we all check our e-mail while we're at work. It used to be something that was unheard of, and then it snuck into our daily ritual from time to time. Nowadays, our clients just give us their work e-mail to cut out the middle man!

With the exception of our elderly clients, almost everyone asks us to e-mail them with any quick updates or information they may need. It's good for them because it enables them to observe the information in front of them at their convenience, without feeling the pressure of an immediate response like a phone call does. It's good for us because we're able to analyze their responses without sounding critical and rushed. Those that want that face-to-face interaction will let us know and we schedule appointments to cater to that. Those who would rather let us do all the work and fill them in when necessary well, we can cater to that, too with the help of e-mail. We want our clients to feel comfortable with us - and when they feel like their money (the large amounts of money, at that) is at the expense of that comfort, we're not doing our job.

I have a long list of reasons why I believe e-mail to be the greatest thing to happen to the workplace, but I'll save you the long and exhaustive rant. Instead, I'll leave it at this: it saves money phone bills and it saves trees. And it may take away the personal experience of a one-on-one conversation in the office, but it sure makes life easier.