Group Emails

[Lamb]

If you're on a committee or a group that uses group emails, how do you make it work? I've never had much luck in getting everyone to do Reply All when it's necessary and sometimes I get dropped from the group and miss out on information.

 

[tango]

If you're on a committee or a group that uses group emails, how do you make it work? I've never had much luck in getting everyone to do Reply All when it's necessary and sometimes I get dropped from the group and miss out on information.

My biggest issue with group emails is when people "reply-all" when it's really not necessary. I particularly hate group texts for the same reason.

When someone sends out a group email and everyone and their dog feels the need to reply with "thanks" but sends it to everyone on the list it fills my inbox with junk for no reason, and makes it more likely I'll tune out something that is actually useful.

 

[Forgiven1]

Group emails for a small number of people is fine, say 3 or 4. Group emails for a larger number gets convoluted. Unfortunately, due to being an officer of an area group, I am in one that is larger. As Tango said, Many people hit "Reply all" when responding that they got the email. Then you have some addresses with the name of the person and others with just the email and you don't always know who is replying with a question.

 

[tango]

Only yesterday I got a group text relating to a local ministry I've been helping with. There's a meeting coming up. I only know two of the numbers on the list, but every single person who says "I'll be there" makes my phone buzz, which in turn makes me think I've got something I need to know about. So the first thing I did was mute that entire discussion. Ironically I can't even make it to the meeting. Maybe I'll let everybody, most of whom don't know who I am, know that I can't make the meeting. You know, just for the irony of it all.

 

[Lamb]

Only yesterday I got a group text relating to a local ministry I've been helping with. There's a meeting coming up. I only know two of the numbers on the list, but every single person who says "I'll be there" makes my phone buzz, which in turn makes me think I've got something I need to know about. So the first thing I did was mute that entire discussion. Ironically I can't even make it to the meeting. Maybe I'll let everybody, most of whom don't know who I am, know that I can't make the meeting. You know, just for the irony of it all.

Sometimes I think a private forum, like something we could do here on CH, would work better. Then people could reply without having to worry about notifications beeping.

 

[tango]

Sometimes I think a private forum, like something we could do here on CH, would work better. Then people could reply without having to worry about notifications beeping.

True, but then everyone would need to be on the same site and it's a bit of a big ask to expect a bunch of people to sign up to a web site so you can send them all a message. And getting people to do that would be coordinated with a group text, so there would be endless notifications as people posted updates with "I just signed up!" and "can't we use some other platform?" and so on.

I was on one group text started by a person who specifically said "Please don't reply, this is for information only" and despite that at least half a dozen people replied with some variation of "got it" or "thanks for the update". Which of course went to everyone else in the group as well.

 

[Lamb]

True, but then everyone would need to be on the same site and it's a bit of a big ask to expect a bunch of people to sign up to a web site so you can send them all a message. And getting people to do that would be coordinated with a group text, so there would be endless notifications as people posted updates with "I just signed up!" and "can't we use some other platform?" and so on.

I was on one group text started by a person who specifically said "Please don't reply, this is for information only" and despite that at least half a dozen people replied with some variation of "got it" or "thanks for the update". Which of course went to everyone else in the group as well.

If the group is planning an event, I think using a forum would make it much easier for tracking and planning purposes.

 

[tango]

If the group is planning an event, I think using a forum would make it much easier for tracking and planning purposes.

It probably would be but getting everybody to agree on a single platform isn't always a trivial process.