My boss told me my emails were too 'aggressive' and I changed everything after that one comment

I work at a small marketing firm in Columbus and my manager pulled me aside after I sent this short reply to a client that was just 'no, that wont work.' She said I sounded like I was mad at them. So now I add a 'thanks for the suggestion' or a smiley emoji to soften it up and honestly I get way less pushback from people. Do you think being too blunt is a real problem or should people just grow thicker skin?

3 comments

3 Comments

caseythompson28d ago

Oh man, same here - I got told I came off as a jerk and adding a simple 'hey' changed everything.

park.miles28d ago

Right? It's wild how just a couple words can flip the whole vibe. Adding a "hey" or "yo" or even their name at the front totally changes the tone from demanding to friendly. I started doing it for work messages and it's like people actually wanna help instead of just doing it. It's basically social cheat code. Once you start noticing it, you see it everywhere in good conversations.

robert65928d ago

The craziest part is seeing the difference play out in texts vs emails. I had two people ask me the exact same question about a project timeline last week. One started with "Hey Robert, quick question" and the other just said "What's the status?" I responded to the first one in like 10 minutes with a full breakdown. The second one sat in my inbox for 3 hours before I shot back a one word answer. Same question, totally different treatment just based on that tiny opener. It's like our brains have this automatic filter that tags anything without a greeting as low priority or even hostile.