02 Dec The Power of the E-Mail “CC:” in Communication

People talk about the power of communication, but lets be more specific and talk about the power of the Cc: in e-mails.

When we learn about how to use the power of communication, we learn that we will benefit from more of it. When we add one person to the Cc: line of an email we double your communication! When we communicate the message to 1 extra person, we “kill 2 birds with 1 stone”, and keep someone else in the loop and increase exposure.

Below are some tips for when to include a Cc: in an email communication.

Working in a Group: When a group of people are working together on a project there are several moving parts, roles people are playing, and steps that have to happen to accomplish the goal. Keeping more people informed about where the progress has been made, allows others to take action. If someone asks a question, why not reply to all with the answer, and everyone will learn. If you have a status update that in any way affects other people, its best to Cc: them on the emails you send.

Working with a Boss: Your boss cares about communication. They like to know what is going on at all times with their projects, their people, their goals, their measurables. A boss and especially entreprenurial bosses really like to see progress being made, and can tell from the messages if the company knowledge and cultural is where they want it to be and if projects are being completed as expected.

Being Subtle: Adding a Cc: is an action that potentially expresses very subtle meanings. Emailing someone to request something from them, and Cc: their boss on the message? That is passive aggressive. Talking about planning something with one person and cc someone else in on the message that you want to be an ally.

The shortcut to add a Cc: without a mouse is through keystrokes Ctrl+Shift+C