To send this email?

[BasinHaircut]

At work I took on a small piece of work outside of my normal area, but still related.

This piece of work has spiralled a bit and it's becoming clear that the project managers didn't have a plan and are struggling to manage what they have started. As a result of this there seems to be lots of group emails that as at as I can tell are just randomly firing off pieces of information to everyone, I assume because they are stretched and want to make sure everyone knows everything in an attempt to make their own lives easier.

Anyway, I've come back from annual leave to 50-odd emails just on this 'small' piece of work. I'm pretty sure that I don't need to see all of them but now I've received them I need to read them to make sure. It's a really busy time of year for my normal work area and time is tight.

The project managers have asked me for a status report and I've been honest and told them that I haven't read any of the emails yet as there are a lot and I have other priorities this week - things that can't wait. I'll try to get round to it this week.

Anyway the emails keep coming and they have asked again when I will be able to report back. Every time an email comes in a obviously scan it to make sure that it's not anything urgent, which obviously takes time.

I've explained that I will try and get it sorted this week but I know it's going to be at least half a day's work and I'm not sure I can spare it. The emails keep coming.

So I have just sent an email asking them to please only cc me on things I actually need to see for my role in the project as I'm struggling to manage what I've been asked to do under the weight of all of the other email traffic and information.

Is that rude?

[Squirmy65ghyg]

No!

[Energumene]

Not rude at all. I'd probably also cc your line manager into the response, so that it is clear you're pushing back and prioritising your more urgent usual duties.

Doesn't sound like they're 'managing' the project at all.

[DementedUnicorn]

Not rude but slightly unprofessional in my view. And I say that as someone who in a previous life would have had upwards of a 1000 of the damn things after a weeks leave, 3/4 of which were totally unnecessary for me stupid email groups.

I find it's standard. Plus if you didn't receive something you needed you'd be even more annoyed so YABU

[Charlesroi]

I don't think it's rude, personally. The unprofessional ones here are the project managers who are scattergunning people with their emails.

But, I guess the PMs are freaking out because they know it's a bit of a shambles,so I'd email them with a firm date when you'll be able to start on the status report. Point out again that the business says your priority is job x, and that you won't be able to do any work on the other job (including reading emails) before this date.
The more emails they send, the longer the job will take. Very annoying for you.

[Niloufes]

I agree hit them back with an email telling them exactly when they should expect a report from you. Put it in your diary and block off time to do it. Even non urgent work needs to be done, but telling those requesting when to expect it should satisfy them.

[BasinHaircut]

demented the thing is that I haven't got time to read an extra 50 emails a week! I don't need to know the mechanics or the detail of the project, I'm basically setting people up on a system for them.

ener yes i cc'd my line manager but I know she will support me anyway.

[LurkingHusband]

Can't you set up rules to automatically manage your email ? You can divert stuff you are cc'd in on to separate folders, or divert by keyword etc etc.

[Wallywobbles]

I once received an email saying the person I had contacted was absent and all emails received would be deleted automatically, so if it was important to email them on their return.

It was thought provoking and a bit surprising. But I could see where they were coming from.

[Sonders]

I was PM'ing a project once where 4 people wouldn't do their timesheets and it was really ballsing up finance management. I sent an email to the 4 people, cc'd in the service director, saying we need them filled out that day.

3 people filled them in and replied all to say they did them, 1 person replied all to say 'Please only CC me in on emails that concern my part of the project'.

Director replied with 'If you read your emails or did your timesheets we wouldn't have to email you at all.'.

The director never gave the guy the time of day again, and he probably missed out on fun projects and development because of it.

[BasinHaircut]

wally we were having that conversation recently in the office. In our area of work you could easily receive hundreds of emails in a weeks holiday that are totally irrelevant by the time you get back so it's something we are considering. Doesn't work internally though!

[BasinHaircut]

sonders I do read them though that's the issue! Although if there are that many I can see why some don't bother.

[2ndSopranosRule]

Unprofessional. Where I work people delight in not Cc-ing then trying to claim the upper hand when you don't have a clue about what they are blaming you for talking about.

Just file/delete/process.

I can get 800+ emails while on leave for a couple of weeks. By asking not to be Cc'd, you've just contributed to everyone else's email traffic...

[cantshakeitoff]

Not rude at all.

Can you ask someone to summarise all these emails for you so you can get on with it sooner?

[PeppaPigTastesLikeBacon]

Not rude. Myself and my line managers do it all the time at work. Of course this also depends on how the email was written