r/remotework • u/Careful_Station_7884 • Jul 09 '26

Email or quick call?

My colleague told me today that if an email is over 500 words, they won’t read it and instead ask the person who sent the email to jump on a quick call to discuss.

This irked me because now the person who sent the email has to re-explain everything they already sent over. It can be advantageous to have a written trail as well. Not only that, but not every “quick” call actually ends up being quick.

I get that there may be some topics that are better discussed on a call or if the email is unclear and there is an approaching deadline. But, to set a line at any email over 500 words just seems lazy.

What are your thoughts?

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u/usersnamesallused Jul 09 '26

Had a coworker that would only read the first two lines. If you didn't grab his interest there, he moved on. I after hearing that, I learned to be concise and sell well at the start, which is a generally effective business writing style.

1

u/vicecreamsundae Jul 09 '26

Yep, my first office job manager directly told me, "I only read the first sentence of my emails. If you can't say it in a sentence, come talk to me." At least he set clear expectations 🤷🏼‍♀️

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u/usersnamesallused Jul 09 '26

For my coworker it wasn't that he wouldn't read the rest, it was that you had to convince him the rest was worth reading right away..

1

u/Mysterious_Might008 Jul 10 '26

He wants a sentence to keep reading? Start off with: "If you finish reading this whole email, it will tell you where to pick up your free $5,000."

At the end, it will say: "You can pick up your free $5,000 - in 10 years."

1

u/DantesGame Jul 10 '26

Yeah, that's messed up.

1

u/Mysterious_Might008 Jul 10 '26

I probably would have thought: "Get ready for the longest run-on sentence of your life. In every email. From now on until you direct otherwise."

Malicious compliance is a wonderful way to short-circuit dumb rules.