I searched our training site, and did not see any courses focused on enhancing typing skills. We also do not have computer-based training software such as “Mavis Bacon Teaches Typing” generally available.

I remember journalism faculty telling classes that it would be beneficial to learn proper typing techniques. I had learned to type in high school, by my mom, who was a good typist. Clicking away on the manual typewriter throughout high school built up my finger strength!

Do your organizations offer typing classes to employees? If not actual courses run by your training departments, do you pay for Mavis Bacon or the other computer-based typing training software?

BAK

And they’ll ask other people to send then shorter messages.

———
About mountains — in organizations where there’s clear depth of management, messages don’t need to go to the top if the VP level (and so on down the charts) is seen as having authority to approve requests, etc.

For PR professionals, once the communications plan is established, it’s easy enough to blow off a lot of info if it doesn’t fit within the parameters.

Don’t make the rules too tight, of course.

And some folks, like Warren, have a hopeless situation anyway. 13,500 members in almost 70 countries — …

And there’s the problem of which rocks on the mountain come to the communicators, all to often in the form of an avalance, and what rocks the communicators go out looking for, like prospectors.

It’s easy enough to read the Times of New York or London or (is there one in???) Sydney and see what the reproters are writing. What’s hard is to go exploring in new York and London and Sydney and see what stories are coming up. Proactive is a lot harder than reactive.

BAK

Eric — point taken. There are few rules without exceptions. I just know that, in many, many…..many cases, long threads stem more from, dare I say, laziness and a wish to document one’s participation in the discussion than a desire to move the discussion toward its conclusion.

By the way - Happy New Year Eric, Ron and Tom.

Those long threads sure pay off when someone forwards you an e-mail and says, “Please deal with this issue.”

Without the thread, you have to spend time tracking down the background, if the person who forwarded you the message isn’t available to brief you.

My bigger concern with the long e-mail threads is the potential for someone to forward confidential information, without realizing the information hidden deep inside the thread.

Just my 2 cents…

Tell your corresponders to bag the habit of sending e-mail with attached threads.

(Some threads are so long and burdened with verbosity, if it were an actual “thread”, it would have to be made of some high-strength carbon-graphite miracle metal.)

Make each message stand on its own. If someone suddenly wakes up and shoots off a frantic, “‘What’s going on here?” Tell them to pay attention and to please ask a specific question.

Without threads, you won’t feel compelled to read old messages. It’ll reduce screen clutter. It’ll also take some pressure off your server’s storage capacity.

It might also reduce ambiguity and improve clarity. No more, “Yeah. I agree with what Sam said, but we should move up the date by a week.”