Short Senders of Firm-Wide Emails

by Johnny Debacle

Every firm has an alias that represents everyone of the firm — you send an intra-office email to this address and everyone in the firm gets it. Every office also has an amazing amount of people who think it’s a good idea EVER to send a non-work related email to the entire firm:

Hey all:

I’m registering for the Save Hot Boobs from Cancer Strip-off for Charity and anyone sponsoring me would be greatly appreciated! I get paid for every hot boob I am able to hit with a nerf gun and I have been training hard for months. I think I can raise a lot of money for charity if you can only spare some money. Especially you, Bill, I saw your bonus and it was enough to buy a vacation home in northern Spain, so I think you can spare a few bucks for hot boobs.

Signed,
Herman Resourcier
[ed note: this signature would be in size 15 of Scripty Font San-Serif and probably in light blue hue]

or

Found a cubic zirconium earring on floor 48, if yours please contact:
Irina Techzocova ext 10007

If not please ignore this email I sent to everyone including the managing partner.

This has astounded me since the very first day of my professional life. In firms ranging from 50 to 1000+ employees, I have received hundreds of firm-wide emails containing attempts to sell tickets to a Christina Aguilera concert, messages about lost $5-10 value items, assorted solicitations for ineffectual charities, accidental pornographic emails, and invitations to parties. This does not even count the incessant HR and IT notices that have been on minutiae so small that they had no need to be sent to the whole firm, yet were sent anyways so that those respective departments could maintain the theater that they are not cipher-ladens pools of mediocrity.

Recommendation: Short anyone who think it’s a good idea to send a non-work related firm-wide email in a 100+ person firm. They will never achieve above average returns because they have negative common sense.

Here is an easy to follow guide on when you should send a non-work related firm-wide email:

  1. Never or
  2. Only with the explicit direction and approval of someone who is your boss’s boss.
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Comments

  1. April 4th, 2007 | 6:10 pm

    This isn’t a suggested addition to your list of valid uses for the “everyone” email address, but I pass it along anyway. While I realize it’s not to be encouraged, I found it funny when I saw it done.

    The steps are:
    a. Go to the desk of a co-worker who’s at lunch. If it’s someone you despise, so much the better.
    b. Send a note to the “everyone” address under that user’s name, something simple like “Hi, how are you doing?”
    c. Be sure to request return receipts from all recipients
    d. Exit stage left, and wait for all hell to break loose when the mail system implodes.