The plan B is to send it again when they’re back though. I think there are a lot of situations where I emailed them and someone else from the start and someone else answered, or I found someone else in the 2 months span until they’re back, or did it myself, or it’s too late to help…. So it does help them avoid following up on things that don’t need following up on.
After I tweeted this example, dozens of people sent me examples of OOO messages they’d set or particularly good examples they’d seen in the wild. One example from a boss (via a TikTok) who offers emailers a decision tree of sorts. “Option 1.) Wait it out. Ask yourself, ‘is this urgent and important?’ If not, take a beat…you and I will be better off with this expectation set now,” the email begins. This one stands out because it’s extremely detailed, manages expectations and also offers who to contact in different situations. It models good behavior of taking time off, but also gives the original sender a variety of option. Most importantly, the responder forces the original sender to assess whether this is actually an urgent request.
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Let’s say you’re a CFO headed to Cancun for your annual vacation. You write an OOO message that contains: The dates of your departure and return Contact information for a colleague that will be available in your absence Some details about your destination
For all support requests/needs, please reach out to [email protected] and one of my colleagues will be happy to assist you.
What it's like to be a child in a vaccine trial. VideoWhat it's like to be a child in a vaccine trial
Not only did Kopelman manage to turn his out-of-office message into an epic poem of sorts, but also, he actually went through the trouble of creating a delightfully snarky, vacation-specific email address for his recipients.
Naturally, she had to take the day off — and couldn't let folks know with any old generic auto-response. Instead, she made a guessing game of it in her out-of-office email, which you can use for yourself, below.
The auto-reply will stop on the date you set for it to stop. If you did not set a start and end date, it may be using a date that is already past. Check this in Gear Icon>Automatic Replies>End Time.
I’ve started going really, really simple on OOO messages – literally just “I’ll be out of the office until ___, please contact ___ for questions about ____”
Thank you for your message. I will be out of the office starting [start date] and returning [return date]. While I am [reason for absence], I will have limited email access.
Obviously, I need to update it. And if you haven't changed your voicemail greeting in over a year, you're likely in the same boat.
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It’s your last day before the vacation starts, you are rushing through your to-do list and suddenly you realize- I need to write an OOO email!
As a person who hates voicemail, I applaud this. Send me an email. Give me a paper trail.
I'm probably in the middle of a tree farm right now, getting covered in tree sap, so my hands would stick to my keyboard if I tried to respond to your email. I'll respond to your email once I am back at work on [date].
I just say “following my return to the office” because saying “as soon as possible” isn’t actually when I’m going to respond — I may have other priorities when I get back that take precedence over responding to a week old email that wasn’t important enough for them to contact my backup. That said, it doesn’t bother me when other people do it!
I’m out of town. I’m looking forward to connecting with you when I return. If you’re getting this note, it means that I’ve received your email. (Thank you!) I’ll respond to your note as soon as I can. In the meantime, here’s a list of five questions that I get asked often. I’ve included brief answers to each one below. Take a peek. You might find the answer that you’re looking for—right away! [Include brief FAQs here] I hope those FAQs were helpful. Don’t worry, though—even if your question was one of the questions listed above, I will still send a personal response to your note as quickly as I can, just to make sure that your question or problem has been completely resolved. Talk to you soon!