I don’t know where to turn for this since Google did NOT help.
Who or what university is teaching people to write emails in the third party? I’m trying to figure out who damaged one of my employees so badly that no one can read his emails.
All emails start with “The writer of this email…” and he is referring to himself.
His subject line is completely filled and short-hand
Almost all of the email is in short-hand and abbreviated, but the wrong way, for instance, he wants to say “expedited” but writes “expo’d”.
At least 2 lines of seperation between each sentence so you have to scroll forever to read 4 sentences.
Is there someone teaching this or did this employee teach himself this email behavior?
And yes, he does talk about himself in the third person or as a team. He constatly says “we” or “the team” when there is no one else but himself.
Should I be wearing a bullet proof jacket to work?
Thank you for your time, the writer of this post is done ranting.
Have you tried directly confronting and criticizing him? How about belittlement? Mockery? The guy sounds like a pretentious douche, trying to hit above his weight in the intellect department.
If you’d prefer to be passive-aggressive, I’d suggest leaving a copy of “Elements of Style” on his desk.
Not to be overly nit-picky here, but this guy sounds like a classic idiot to me, not a pretentious douche.
Pretentious douches typically are pretty good at what they do; and, therefore like to take the opportunity to be pretentious douches about it. This guy is just a straight email loser.
Charles thinks this is equally & (and) obnoxious. I’m guessing he is young. The txt generation shortens evrythng. But the 3rd person I bet is all his own. Good luck with this, would drive me nuts
I typed in “The writer of this” and “Email” and “Letter” to see if anyone was teaching this.
Yes, he went to a a NorthEast College, accredited.
He is actually almost 50.
I don’t believe he ever used a pc or computer until 2 years ago.
He’s the type of person that read the dictionary, all of it.
He has also attended at least one place about proper communication styles. Dale Carnegie I think.
I’m ranting and likely being petty, but I’m also trying to figure out the best approach to teaching him proper email manners but it also translates over to the way he speaks to others. Before I can try to help him, I need to understand where he learned this behavior so I can try to break it.
He is not conforming to the rest of the employees and I can not just fire him. Pretty sure I can’t knock him out either. It is at the point where others are asking me to intervene.
I have tried highlighting his emails and showing him where he is going wrong. I have tried to talk to him. I have also tried to gently mock him in private, but that was out of frustration.
I really want to find out how he picked this behavior up and if it was learned from a book or online or at a class somewhere.
Actually had a former co-worker who interviewed for his first out of college job in the third person.
Interview consisted of meeting with two different managers, interview with the first manager he thought he did very poorly and wasn’t going to get the job, so why not have fun with the next manager! First question: “Tell me about yourself” response: “Well let me tell you a little bit about John xxx”. Then went on with the whole interview in 3rd person…and got hired! Manager liked it, said the guy had guts and confidence.
1.) No use of the third person or first person plural when referring only to yourself.
2.) No abbreviations beyond date and address.
Acronyms, both common and particular to your industry, would still be OK to use.
I guess you and Tigerchik would still have to live with the one (1) problem, but it would be a lot better.
Just tell him people are having a hard time decyphering his cryptic emails and that he needs to use full sentences and proper grammar, or else he gets shit canned.
Corresponding in third person is used by older people in France, England, and other parts of Europe that had a high level of illiteracy until recently. I saw it a lot when I was stationed in France.
What you are describing almost sounds like it was taught to him by his parents. Maybe they were illiterate and he was tasked with doing their correspondence, and that style of writing has become a habit?
Have you attempted to speak to him about his writing? It might be as simple as telling him to stop doing it.