Some email I have for myself, and for people who want to get better at email.
Why should you get better at email?
A trivial thing to get better at, but can mean the difference between getting funded or not or getting a job or not.
What should you know about emailing important people?
Famous, powerful, and interesting people all personally read their email and respond fast (or as fast as they possibly can).
However, interesting and successful people often get a lot of emails (and are incredibly busy). Any non-important email with friction or looks like it is will get either deprioritized or remains as “read” forever.
Therefore, my approach to emailing these kinds of people is to index on conciseness (low friction to read) and actionability (low friction to respond).
What should I do to get better at emailing these people?
- Skip introductory greetings (“Good morning!”) and follow the “BLUF” framework: bottom-line up front. Asking for something? Ask for it first, provide context after.
- Use bullet points to visually break up information to a more manageable state.
- If emailing for advice, be super clear who you are and have a very specific ask. For example, don’t email “How do I get a job at finance?” Email “I’m trying to get a finance job. I’m doing X, Y, Z. What do you recommend me to do moving forwards?”
- Even better, attempt to frame your questions such that the responder only needs a “Yes or no.” Unsure how to get started on your task? Don’t ask “I’m lost, where do I begin!” Ask, “I’m lost. Here’s what I’ve brainstormed as a solution, is this the right path to go down?” (Again, this reduces the friction to reply.)
Misc tips related to emails in general
- Batch check your emails. To respond fast, check once an hour and process emails that need or should be sent out ASAP. Otherwise, delegate until a set time later to process everything else.
- Any email you’ve written twice to answer someone should be a blog post. Next time, just send the blog post and save your time.