Tag: sending emails at work

Using Your Preferred Pronoun

There’s been a trend to use your preferred pronoun in email signatures like as:

Joe Jones (he/him)

Zadie Zorn (she/her)

Leslie Madison (they/them)

I might have written about this before in here. I’m going to cover it again for new followers.

I’ve read that when a cisgender person lists their preferred pronoun it helps Trans and other individuals feel safe to do the same.

Is it possible though that when you identify as they/them in an email and the person receiving it hasn’t met you in person they will attribute traits to you based on your perceived identity?

Only none of us should fear expressing our gender identity. Feel free to fire up they/them after your name in an email.

Having gender pride is a healthy form of self-expression.

I’ve decided that in 2021 I’m going to go the she/her route in my work email signature.

This is one of the few areas where the fact that “everybody’s doing it” makes sense for a person to follow along.

Of course the choice is yours. You have the right to list only your full name and job title in a work email.

It gets dicey further when composing the content of an email message.

I’ll talk about this in the coming blog entry.

Your Work Email Signature

I’ve decided to feature a blog entries carnival about sending and receiving emails at work.

You don’t want to be That Person. The one who thinks they’re being clever. Yet is only serving to antagonize their coworkers with a snarky message.

Case in point: using a pointed quote in your email signature like the following:

Kayla King, Senior Office Aide

Working smarter not hard

I ask you: is your email signature the best avenue for promoting yourself? I think not.

Last week I cracked open this fortune cookie:

Working efficiently is doing the job right. Working effectively is doing the right job.

Making an excuse for your behavior if you ask me will come across as trying to justify doing the bare minimum.

Your work ethic should speak for itself.

This email signature tactic might help someone else. I doubt you and I will benefit from attaching a gimmicky quote after our names.

In the coming blog entry: what you can and should list after your name.