Top 11 List: Ban These Words From Your Emails

David Silverman at the Harvard Business blog had a great post today called, "10 Business Words to Ban."

My two favorites listed are "net-net" and "value add." There are some other humdingers, so you should check out the post in case you're wondering how annoying you really sound to other people.

David recommends banning them from your biz speak and I'd like to second him on that and relate it to the focus of this blog: email. When writing it's even more important to be cognizant of how you're using these outdated, no substance terms. Are you guilty of using them in email?

To make this a top 11 list, I'm adding one of my own. I commented on David's blog with my entry. Here's what I wrote:

How about: "Let me know if you have any questions?"
What are we really saying? I know I've probably just given you erroneous, confusing information so if you don't understand it, let me know? Or are we saying I know you probably don't feel like you can normally ask me a question, but in this case it's okay?

"Let me know if you have any questions" is a lazy out for lack of a better way to end a conversation or email.

How about you. Got a 12th?

This post is one from my "Email 50" project. The goal is to publish 50 consecutive posts providing helpful advice on how to do email better in this information overloaded world.