Our senior leadership has admitted to not checking voicemails since we started working remotely…almost 15 months ago. It made me feel so good. I hate voicemail.
The use of animated holiday email signatures creates a sense of memorability as it is more eye-catching and engaging. Ornaments and gifts with Santa and reindeers flying will take it up a notch and increase your chances of a unique email signature. Sometimes, a minor detail may be enough to make it amazing.
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Our auto-replies to outside people are two or three paragraphs long though, which feels ridiculous but is actually necessary.
Former boss used to put an OOO for EVERYTHING. Like, “I’m doing interviews today and will reply tomorrow.” Nothing was ever on fire so it could have indeed waited until tomorrow without the OOO – people probably wouldn’t have noticed.
2.) Benvenuti alla John Doe. L’azienda è in vacanza ma il nostro servizio clienti sarà di nuovo disponibile da Lunedì 04.07.2016. La spedizione degli ordini ricomincerà l’01.11.2016. Nel frattempo siete pregati di inviare le vostre richieste tramite email a: [email protected] o compilando il modulo di contatto. Grazie Mille!
I find it rude because if I emailed them, it might be an FYI but requiring no action. If they just delete it, they might then be confused about project status later. I would be annoyed to have to re-send a message after the fact because they don’t think ANY email during their time off has value.
Depending on the type of holiday, you can create specific templates for various holidays such as Christmas Thanksgiving, New Year etc.:
One nice compromise I’ve seen is that some people add upcoming PTO to their email signature for a week or two beforehand. That way the people you’re working with right then get a heads up without needing to spam everyone with the information.
Like the previous examples, the message doesn’t have to be lengthy – you just need to let people know the details, and who they should be contacting in your absence.
Huge pet peeve – several of my coworkers still have COVID-related out of office notifications. I didn’t find them necessary in the first place, since everyone was still working from home and should have been checking emails normally, but it’s especially weird now that we’re officially back in the office a couple of days a week. It feels like they’re making a preemptive excuse for responding slowly. I’m surprised management hasn’t said something, honestly.
As to who you choose, you might consider listing a coworker, your supervisor, or an on-call number if available. Just make sure to clear this with whomever you pick as a support person so they’re aware they’re backing up your calls and emails for emergent situations.
Voice mail is a strictly worse medium than almost any alternative. You don’t get the opportunity to converse and ask questions back and forth like you do with a phone call; you can’t extract information efficiently from the message like you can with an email (the old “ugh, I have to listen to this entire message over again just to check one thing he said at the end” scenario).
That’s weird. I’m technically teleworking almost all the time (our office doesn’t really have the space to fit us all in anyway) and I’m next to my computer nearly the whole day…
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In general, because of my position (C suite) my OOO messages are boring and predictable. I’m out from xx date to xx date. If you need help in my absence, please contact xyz person. Otherwise, I will reply to your email upon my return. blah blah blah
If one were concerned about the message rubbing people the wrong way, it’s certainly something that can work with a bit of rephrasing: “I’m out on leave from X to Y. All messages received during that time will be deleted. Please resend your request after Y, or else contact Z for urgent assistance.”
In my much, MUCH younger days, I printed out a photo of a cruise ship with an arrow and “I am here” pasted on it and taped it to my monitor…