 Okay. So, hello. My name is Carmen. I'm actually an occupational therapist and I'm from New Mexico. So, I don't know if any of you have ever worked with an occupational therapist kind of personally or professionally. So, I'm just going to assume that you don't know what I do. What I do is I work with people across the entire lifespan. I have a client who's two and I have a client who's 95. And we do anything and everything that they need to do. So, it could be fine motor control. It could be working the keyboard. It could be after a stroke. Really kind of every day is a different day. But I spend all day, every day, interacting with people. And it is my job to get them invested in their own recovery, which is sometimes the hardest part. Another thing that falls under my scope of practice is appropriate communication and social interaction because that's kind of the root of a lot of things. And children, some with autism, don't know how to appropriately interact. And then a lot of adults with traumatic brain injuries have to be relearned that and be retaught it. So, I'm going to tell you guys about different strategies for appropriate communication via email. Okay. So, really the whole point of this are these objectives. But also, when you know the rules, you can break them. And I want you guys to have these kind of confident resources of when in doubt this is my go-to kind of language. And if you're a manager or if you yourself have kind of second guess yourself when you're communicating, you can make yourself a little template and have a go-to formula. Specifically, I'll discuss examples of informal and informal communication. And when we use code switching. And I'll explain a little bit more about that. So, code switching, this is the definition I'm going to be using today. When you look it up, you can find other examples. And it's frequently used in multi-lingual context. And it's used when people are switching between different languages. So, that's not what I'm talking about here. Especially the behaviors and thinking about the context of the email because it is a form of communication. And when do you code switch for the appropriate type of communication? If this is a very urgent matter, maybe email it's not the right form of communication. Maybe it is. Again, that's another conversation that you can have with your team because some people may not innately get what is the appropriate type of communication for the problem or concern or what works best for you. Another thing that I want to be very clear that this presentation is not about is it's not me telling you how to fit into your work environment. Every work environment has its own culture and you're going to do well to pick up on that culture. There's been a lot of research in the last five to ten years on people of color and other minorities code switching to a wider voice, wider clothing, wider hair, wider food for lunch, whiter. And I'm not going to be talking about that here, but there's some really important articles. So I've included those here and it's online for if you want to kind of get started because if you're a manager or a team member of a kind of multicultural environment, this would be some good stuff that you may not be aware of. Okay. So this is a poll. I would like you guys, you can text it, you can use a QR code or you can get online and I would love to know how confident are you in this moment that you know what is considered formal versus informal communication. Well, that's beautiful. Okay. I'm going to move on. I'm glad everyone is so confident. Oh, okay. Okay. So before I get into those specifics, there's a lot of research that's been done in communication fields and linguist fields looking at specific word selection. And this Cohen study came out with four types of emails. This is what you do in an email. Now, you can combine all of them. But again, why are you even bothering to communicate via email? If you're just using teams and it's just a quick message, that's your form. So what is the purpose behind it? But keeping this in mind again, why are you even bothering with email in the first place? Okay. So in this Peterson article, they did a great job of looking at what specifically when do you go formal or informal? And there's a theory called the theory of politeness by Brown and Levinson and the bigger the request, the more formal something is. Now, again, for me asking for PTO in my place of work is really informal. But in other places, it may be more formal. So when in doubt, think about the size of the request. They also looked at going up rank or hierarchy in your work environment. So if you go if you're in the two ranks above or below, kind of typically more informal, but if you go above and you hit about four ranks, typically more formal. So when in doubt, if you're going above the chain, go more formal. And then also typically more informal when it's a casual personal conversation kind of over email, if you're asking a very casual request or a casual conversation, you can go informal. If you have just met this person and it's more business related, I would go with formal. Okay. And then they looked at all of the grammatical structures of emails. And so here's just a chart to look at more exclamation marks, more informal ellipses. My mother is a big fan of those in emails and text messages and uses them excessively informal communication jargon jargon is to be considered for any of this technical speak. I've gone to several sessions. It is over my head. I am a healthcare provider. It's all in jargon, but it's appropriate for the place. So thinking about how much jargon you want to be using in an email, because if you're emailing a general public, probably want to use less. And then they looked at the frequency of emails. So if you and I are communicating all the time, you can do informal. If we're emailing once a year, probably should err on the side of formality. And again, the kind of the closeness of that person. The people who just email in all lowercase, I don't understand them. And the people who do subject lines in all lowercase or all caps can have like an emotional response associated because all caps is looked at as someone yelling at you. So lowercase can also have another thing. Okay. So just being aware of this. So here's an example. And we're going to do the poll again, the next one. So these two emails are the examples of informal or formal communication. Give you a chance to read it. And then I'll move the slide. So are those informal or formal? And your opinion. So does it matter one in that request? Arguably, maybe not. But these were examples of informal communication. And I use that because there are things that I like to use specifically for informal communication, like I love exclamation marks. I use that to try and put people at ease and show some of my personality of email because it is just text, which also goes to show that people are reading into emails, myself included. Okay. So code switching. How when if you know when you want to say something in formal language versus informal language, how do you switch your language to mere that? So I did an example here, just a basic email. And then here's a formal example of it. And here's an informal example. And you can see kind of the start contrast, less filler words, less greetings, very straight into the point. And like the word tad, I'm a tad worry, that's a very subjective term, it doesn't instill a lot of confidence. That's a very informal kind of a thing that you would send to a colleague, probably not the boss that you were answering to for this project. So again, examples of code switching for the type of environment that you're in. Okay, if anyone has any questions, go ahead and just raise your hand whenever. Okay, so why should you care? And the reason is when you are intentional with your code switching with the message that you are giving out, you have more control over the ability, it's how it's received. And the whole reason we're communicating is because we have a message, either an ask or request. And we'd like them people to receive it the way we intend it to, because there is absolutely nothing worse when something is taken the way you did not intend it, because there's a lot of cleanup that has to happen. Okay. Okay, so I've given you this information. So there's one more component that needs to go into this. And this is where it gets, you've probably never thought about it to this extent. We're gonna talk about greetings. And in this one study, it sets the tone of the email, which makes sense. It's your opener. It's your chance to say how formal this is going to be. People can get really creative with this. There's not a lot of flair that you can have with this. But here's kind of more examples. If you do, you know, my name is Carmen, dear Carmen versus dear Miss McClelland, a little bit of a different tone. Hey, Carmen, hi, Carmen. Pretty casual. I think it's fine. To whom it may concern is kind of the utmost formality. If the body of your email does not match that, it's kind of weird. So we want this to be cohesive. So again, cohesive. And then you see this in kind of company wide emails, you're sending them to multiple people. And depending on the content of it, you'll see it be more informal or formal. It really just kind of is a is a grab bag of how people typically like to write when they're sending emails, like if there's an outage or there's a company update, like for my software, then I get an email pretty informal language. If someone's being fired, or they're, you know, announcing a new position because someone's been let go, typically more formal language. There was a great study of Iranian PhD students at a Malaysian University, and looking at English as a second language for greetings. And in our society, when you say Miss Carmen, it's kind of a more pediatric term a lot of schools. But in that culture, dear Miss Carmen was a sign of the utmost respect. So keeping in mind, again, the intent of the receiver. How are they meaning to do this? So I'm not telling you to change your style or if you have a go to phrase in your language. It's just how is it going to be received? Okay, the next one. Okay, so what is your go to email sign off? Because people typically have one that they use the most. I'm activating it. We were having a little bit of trouble with this earlier. Okay, it should have been better now. Yeah. Thank you. That's my favorite. I love best. Nope, just think you're go to like when in doubt this is the one I typically use. For me, it's best. Thanks in advance. Okay. Oh, yeah, I like that. Okay, so different ones, my go to one is best. I like best. I felt it was appropriate. Most times I sent out again, I'm a medical professional. I sent out an email to a team and was slightly very strongly upset with a nurse and signed it best Carmen. And I had a physical therapist contact me and say, Oh my gosh, you were being so passive aggressive with that. I didn't intend for it. You know, I was being blatantly aggressive. I didn't feel that the best really turned it into something else. But it was it was just interesting to see that I could have chosen now I'm more selective when I use best and cheers to not appear passive aggressive. Unless that is my goal, because because then I'm code switching. That's exactly what my intent is to be passive aggressive. So sign off. This is where the fun is. This establishes the relationship between you and the recipient. Again, I used best at a team meeting when a nurse had done something that I completely disagreed with and chose best. These are five categories of sign off. And so again, people get more flair. There's actually a woman on TikTok who sends company or sends emails to her boss with a new kind of fun sign off. And she has I think five or six videos until her boss kind of catches on. But there's there is some fun. But again, depending on your work environment and what the purpose is, use it accordingly. So again, it's up to you. So no sign off. The research calls these bald emails. And there's no sign off or no greeting. Kind of more informal. You're just jumping to the point. I appreciate those. Those are very efficient use of my time. I know who sent them. I can see the email address. Thanks very much first. Thanks. Thanks. Again, you could just see the variation and then dash Carmen or dash C, which is also one of my go to ones for the more informal ones. Again, if I don't know my last name, we don't have my contact information. It's pretty informal. So the first category are the call to actions, which is like thanks in advance implying that you will be doing something for me. We're going to come back to this. And again, can be used in a passive aggressive way can also be used to say, Hey, I'm going to follow up on this implying that we will have further communications, which could lead you more towards informal emails, but also depending on the content, it could change. See, then we have the classics and the more professional that are commonly used. Every again, you have your go to and all of those go to ones are pretty much here except the thanks in advance, which is a common one again. Then we have the non traditional ones that are just fun. And again, this does not work in my work environment because I'm emailing a medical team. But I do enjoy and I've tried to use some of this when it's kind of informal things. But again, stay positive test negative was a big one in my place of work with COVID tests. And people, you know, they have the inspirational quote at the end, it says something about you. You're only going to use this in the utmost informal thing. If you're asking for a raise and you throw in a still a pasta, like I don't I don't see this going well for you. But again, it's something to think about because it is a chance to use personality and you use this to establish a relationship with the recipient. And you're doing that because you typically want something from them. Gratitude and thanks. You know, when you when you work with a project to you, this is kind of your profusely thanking them in a way. And this is this is the last thing they have in their mouth, you know, before the email is over. So this is their last thought of you. And again, we want to use this to our advantage. Looking forward to this collaboration, I think is a great one to say, Hey, thank you so much. This is so exciting. And again, also in a passive aggressive way, thank you so much for following up on this. Thank you for, you know, getting to this. There's a way. But again, your intent. Anticipation is another category of also implying that we have more communication. And that there's going to be follow up. But these are more common on a Friday afternoon. So it doesn't mean that you're being formal or passive aggressive. It's just what's appropriate on a Friday afternoon. Say, Hey, I'll talk to you on Monday. Hope you have a good weekend. So all of these are just a little little smidge of email sign offs. And you probably had no idea that this is how much time people think about these things. So when in doubt, maybe have your go to ones that you probably already use, and then make sure that people are receiving them the way you intend it to. And if you're having someone that you work with, that you can't tell from the tone of their email what they mean. That might be an area of something that they can work on to improve. Because especially when you're talking to people who are not in your business like me, kind of matters maybe a little bit more because there's a little less grace, a little late, less leeway in that. Okay, so I believe in practicality. And how do we use this in practice? And so again, who is the audience? You're going to email me differently than you would each other. What is the purpose of the email? Why are you sending this email? I fully believe that if it's easier for you to send it in a text or a phone call, please do that. Time is my most precious commodity and I assume it's yours too. So we don't want to waste time. And then word selection. So what are my sign offs? What are my greetings? And again, being very clear, I what is my intent? And I say that because that's the purpose. Because why communicate if you don't even know why you're communicating? That could have been said or not said at all. There is great, when someone just doesn't send the email, you appreciate it. You know, it just, some stuff doesn't need to be said. And so there's some, some power in that restraint. So, okay, let me activate. So I'm going to ask you at the next one is, which is the most formal? I'm going to go forward. But if, if I need to circle back, okay, I'm going to assume that's done. Okay, I'm going to go back to this. So specifically, I wrote C as the most formal. And the reason is, there is no passive aggressiveness in it. It is very straightforward and to the point. There's no fluff. But C and D and D, per my previous email, how many times have you guys had to say that now that there's not, you know, maybe less in-person meetings? Like, please, and you CC and it's forward the original email that maybe you sent two weeks to go with the exact information that they're asking for. And being just very clear and concise. There is something to be said for clear and conciseness, even if it's maybe not the friendliest. But there's a certain point where behavior maybe is not accepted. And you need to say, this is what needs to happen now. Thank you so much. And here's a deadline. Does anyone, for the person or people who selected B? I'm curious why you selected it. Why do you select it? Yeah, I think I don't see the rationale because it invites collaboration. And it's not necessarily saying you're wrong. But I would like to invite this kind of dialogue that's going to happen. Definitely less hostile than D. D's hostile. D's also going to get that stuff by 5 p.m. Otherwise, we have a big problem. And then I like C because it's, again, difficult to write four variations of the same email, but tweak it just enough. But it is subjective. So again, looking at what you think is the most formal or the utmost respect that you're going to do for your colleague, your boss, whoever you're sending this to, they may receive it differently. But there's variation. C, B, and D, or at least C and D, most people felt were formal. You're good to go. No one thought A was formal. A was not formal. So it's not, there is some ambiguity in there, but there are some kind of hard-ish lines that most people kind of respond to. Oh, yes. Yeah, again, yes. And to be honest, if you saw B, C, or D in an email, there's a little bit more formality to it just from the way they're structured and kind of the point. I think when I ask someone to elaborate on something, especially an email, I work very hard on not trying to sound defensive with my point to say why I disagree with that. Tell me more. And to be honest, I will probably call this person because I don't, I don't want to act like I'm antagonizing them or I'm questioning their judgment. I'm questioning because I'm interested in their answer and I want to learn more from their perspective. So, but again, that's my take because I sound much friendlier on the phone and I know that does meet good in certain situations and I will cut switch. I will switch my form of communication. So if in that instance because I have asked those questions because I want to understand why they're saying that because am I missing something? I would just call them and say, hey text them, hey do you have a second? Can you get on the phone? Can I call you? And that has saved me a lot of face. In the Levenson and Brown, the people who created the theory of politeness, they came up with this other theory of the theory of saving face and the importance and it's a lot of people have discussed it because it's been around for a couple, you know, a couple decades. But how do you set someone up to save face? To not, especially when someone's maybe in the wrong, you want to allow them kind of a graceful exit. And so especially in that way, I want to save face and just call them because I don't want them misconstruing what my purpose is, what my actual intent is. So I think it's kind of a trick question and I just put this in here to kind of allow for this discussion because it is a personal choice but it's subjective. But there are some kind of rules and we saw that here. Most people thought C and D were the most formal. B, I liked it. Again, I would use that and then call them and then call them up. Okay, so just another example of the code switching and this is when I versus kind of a more formal email style versus an informal and just literally four, five word choices changes. That's it. And for me, it changes the entire tone of it. Even though the message is the exact same, I've added in something for me. I feel like I cushion it. I'm not being mean. I'm asking for something and I'm being efficient with it because I still have my deadline. I'm not just saying can you get it to me when you get when up to you. I still need something and Susan feels absolutely valuable because I really need her feedback. And people like to help people when they feel valued, whether you mean it or not. So the code switching, okay, when you are talking kind of colleague to colleague, typically more informal, but again, if you do not communicate with this colleague that often may want to err on the side of formal. And then again, what is the level of the request? Are you asking someone to just give feedback on something pretty informal? If you're asking them to cover a shift, it can be kind of maybe a little bit more formal, but just thinking about the language. And again, if there's anyone in your office or your team where especially email communication is not coming off the way you know that they intend it to mean or it comes off abrasively, this is an example of where you can really talk to someone and this is code switching. Here we go. This is what I would like to do. And it's called storying. In my profession we do social stories for people to plan out what their response is going to be when it happens. So something you can do as a manager. When this happens, this is my response. Fill in the blank. It's not taking away anyone's creativity, their identity, it's just streamlining it so people don't have to feel stressed about the response. Okay, colleague to manager. Again, this is really up to you and your manager. My boss texted me today. I spoke to a few people and they said my boss would never text me. That is completely inappropriate. But for me, because of my line of work, it's not. If teams is a great way to set up if you're in the office, hey can we set something up? Can I come by? I know some people, they want to know as soon as something happens so they can fix it in real time because they don't want people to get farther along. So if you don't know what your team needs, what your manager needs, if you just ask them what their preferred style of communication is when there's a problem, it may save you a lot of headache. Also, if you do what they ask, if you do what your manager asks and say hey, just call me or text me and we'll set up a time and they don't respond and they get upset, it's out of your control. You did everything that they asked for and if they didn't like it, it's on them at that point. But it is a nice way for you to discuss this with your team or your manager to set up those rules that will prevent miscommunications from happening in the future. And then to the general public, never assume the understanding of the recipient. I cannot tell you how much I hate feeling like I'm being spoken down to. No one knows my background, so don't assume it. Yes, I don't know anything that what people are saying here, but still what if this was my hobby? This is like my jam. You don't know that. And I found this a lot with older adults. You never knew what their first career was, so don't assume because you may be talking to a nuclear scientist, which happens quite a bit in Albuquerque. We have a lot of scientists. Los Alamos is the number one PhD per capita, so don't assume anything because you may be talking to the person who like invented the theory. But also don't assume that they know what you're talking about, so just I don't want to say dumb it down, but start from the most basic, the scratch level, and then invite them and say, hey, does this make sense? Not in a patronizing way, but just I want to make sure you have any questions. Do you use a different term than I use? That's why abbreviations can be difficult and maybe you want to spell stuff out because you don't want anyone to miss what you're saying or not feel comfortable to ask because what you're saying matters. If it doesn't, why are you saying it? And then again, what's the previous level of communication? So if you speak to someone quite often of a different field, if you're trying to sell your product to someone, if you're trying to get investors of a different kind, changing how you speak to them, it's only going to serve you. You are not selling out by wearing or you know speaking differently or not using the technical terms of your product. You don't want to lose them before you ever get them, okay? The take home point, communication is power. It's the way we express our needs, our desires, our wants at the most fundamental level. If your message is worth understanding, then it's worth being good at communicating. If it's not, don't bother. And I really like this, when you know the rules, you can break them. It's just like grammar. Then you can get fun with it. Then you can have rules because you can always can revert back to the most basic formal level of how you know the job interview. You're probably going to aim on the formal side and then you can have fun with it later, but you can always have those tools in your back pocket. I'm not telling you to sell out. And when in doubt, mirror the sender. If you don't know, just mirror what they're doing. If they're giving you informal language, just give them informal language. I was speaking to a friend who was here and let me know that he had a colleague that just kept sending formal emails back all the time, no matter how informal his emails were. He's like, I wish he would just feel good enough and it's like, well now you're feeling awkward about email communication. So it's just interesting. So when in doubt, do that. And the ultimate example of code switching. I am a occupational therapist that is presenting to you today. I've changed my background side. I dressed more formally. I made sure to wear my glasses instead of my contacts. I changed my language. I code switched this entire thing because I felt that my message was more important than me using different kinds of language. So that's it. Any questions? Hi. My question is about remote work. So we found ourselves overnight working with folks in Asia, folks in London, UK and whatnot. And a lot of times you don't have the luxury of synchronous communication, i.e. texts or phone calls or Zoom meetings or whatnot. So in that regard, have you actually thought about how email communication or asynchronous communication can be geared towards sending the message across and making the communication productive at the same time, treading the nuances of what's considered formal, informal, passive, aggressive and so on? So when I send emails and I wasn't remote. I stayed in the hospitals. So I didn't have that only in one aspect of a job. But what I do when I need someone's attention, I'm not going to send five emails, especially if it's going to take them eight hours to respond. I'm not going to do the foreplay of it. I'm just going to get straight into the meet. And so I will do longer emails, but breaking them up by bullet points, by numerical order, because when they finally get to it in their own time, I want them to answer everything. So that's why, because it is asynchronous, you're not going to get them when you need them and you're not going to have that rapport going back and forth. So sending something in a longer email, breaking it up so their eyes can see it because the strain and no one, no one likes to look at a paragraph of an email, like make it aesthetically pleasing so you, they can even get to the bullet points. But then it allows for that meet, the meat of the matter in there. So that's how I see it and that's what I personally do in my communication when someone's hard to get a hold of. So I just lay it all out there. Thank you guys. I appreciate this and, oh yes. I wanted to get your thoughts on communicating feedback and what has worked well for you in the past, be it written or be it face to face, what are some good ways to give feedback, both good feedback. I know you mentioned about gratitude and showing appreciation for what your colleagues have done, but how about some constructive feedback, what has worked well for you in the past? That's a whole, like the art of giving feedback is a fantastic book. Feedback and being able to give feedback well. The people who do it, you just spot them and you're like please tell me what I can do more of. Research-wise I don't know for me because I also teach at the OT University or the University of Mexico OT graduate program with first years and they're stressed and they're very scared and having to give feedback because at some point they're going to be my colleagues. I try and always say why am I even saying this? What's the bigger picture? What's the reason for this? Because they may not get the details now but explaining how it fits into it. That's worked well for me and to always ask for feedback in return. I always ask it and even though I may be crying on the inside, I show absolutely like I am receiving at 100% and then I will go cry in my car but I want to show them that I value their opinion as well. I do when I teach, I do a check-in and a check-out. I do rose, thorn and bud and it's a way to just get everyone on the same page because it was synchronous learning during COVID which these grad students were in the healthcare field. It was a little stressful and that was a nice way to set the tone because I knew where people's heads were and their hearts at that moment maybe and maybe today is not the right time to give that feedback but also set the expectation that at the end of every session I'm going to ask for it for myself and I'm going to give it but if you want to hold on to something for another three weeks not my problem. It gave you the opportunity in real time. I don't know if that gives anything but I feel like you have something to say. Yeah I was just curious, I mean it's funny because I guess just like where I sit generationally in terms of I guess the demographics and age demographics involved it seems silly to ask this but I was just curious about like how you feel like emojis fit into that code switching discussion because like I'll just describe the situation that I've run into where like I'm an engineering manager and I've run into a situation where we're starting to hire a lot more people who are in like like we have like Gen Z people entering the workplace and I've had uh some of my reports be like oh well that sounded really standoffish like why didn't you use an emoji to clarify the tone and then I've also have a director who is my boss who's like who gave me feedback on like my 360 being like you should use less emojis because it makes you sound unprofessional so it's like we're in this weird transitional state where I'm just wondering how that like fits in or if that's something that should be avoided or you should sort of like be a chameleon and like blend in with those people I look I love a good emoji on my cell phone caveat my documentation is part of people's medical record that could be called to court I do not need to say but look I put this emoji and see it was friendly it was nice look they did really well um I honestly think so so for again outsider totally different job um what what's the um rules that your place of work because the manager above you should be like we don't use emojis or we do or use them amongst each other um I I feel like emojis I'm sorry again I love them they have a time and a place and if you cannot convey your thought and opinion without a picture that's maybe something to work on because that matters because how are you conveying a product and how are they going to grow because not everyone does emojis and some people especially cross-culturally may not be into them and especially with older generation I code switch all the time grumpy old men are my jam I can code switch them into the ground you want a veteran um somewhat dementia who's just pleasant being able to do that it's an important skill for them to be able to use too um so I would talk to kind of like your boss and are there not rules but parameters and maybe they should try communicating without emojis and see if their message is still received the same because that could be a skill set for them to work on well we're done