Business E-mail Forwarding Reflects on You!

With every e-mail that I send, I know that it could be forwarded to others without my knowledge. Even though you should never forward an e-mail sent to you to a third party without the original Sender’s permission, people still do it all the time.

What you forward and how, speaks volumes about you as a person. Here are some things you don’t want to do when forwarding e-mails while using your business address on company time:

If you forward one person’s e-mail to play office politics, be an e-tattler or to play one coworker against the other is simply unprofessional. If you have questions for one coworker or contact based on another concerns, type a new e-mail and address those concerns. Don’t forward without the other party’s knowledge with a “See what they say?” tone. This just reflects a lack of respect and your extremely low level of professionalism.
If you forward e-mails from one coworker to another without the original Sender’s permission in an effort to say “Can you believe this?”, you are a not a team player and show you are not to be trusted.
If you forward e-mails that are not appropriate for the work place and think that by putting NSFW (Not Safe For Work) in the subject takes you off the hook — it doesn’t. Doing so shows you have no respect for your job and employer or those you are sending to. And you could still be fired for misusing company resources.
If you forward without comment, you come of as terse, rude and demanding. What do you think it says about a person who cannot take the time to type a Hello, include a brief instruction and a TIA? Bossy or discourteous?

Every effort you make online, or feel is unnecessary to make will reflect upon how you are perceived and is good business. Think very carefully about how, what, when and who you forward to. Your reputation, integrity and character are literally at stake.