You know those emails that just work? The ones that get an instant reply and not because the person felt like you were chasing them down, and not because you wrote a novel, but because you made it ridiculously easy for them to respond. Well, I recently sent a three line email to a client of mine during a high-stakes situation, and his reaction stopped me in my tracks.

He wrote back, I'm taking more than 10 seconds just to tell you how much I love this email. And it made me realize it wasn't just a check in email. It was a miniature masterclass in designing communication for humans who are busy, stressed and totally overloaded. So today I want to unpack for you why this email worked so well and how you can use the same technique yourself to get faster, clearer and kinder communication from the people that you work with. By the end of this episode, you'll know exactly how to craft ultra-short, ultra-effective emails that reduce cognitive load, preserve politeness, increase response rates, and strengthen your working relationships. All with just a few thoughtfully designed choices.

So here's the situation that I was in at the time that I wrote this email. So as you may know, I have a slate of executive coaching clients and this particular executive coaching client, let's just call him Bob, he was in the midst of a very stressful, very unusual situation that he and the executive team that he works on were part of. Now, he was the lead person on this, so I was only coaching him on this specific issue. Now, Bob's been a client for quite a while and our usual cadence for meetings when we're in an executive coaching relationship was every other week. Now this specific situation, like I mentioned, was very high stakes and so we were taking a different approach that didn't necessarily follow that every two week rhythm. So this was much more of an as needed cadence. And we met a few times on this specific intense situation. And then silence.

Nothing dramatic, just the quiet that happens when either things might be settling down or might be going sideways. Hard to know because silence means so much and yet so little. So this is the email that I sent.

Subject line: Super Quick Check in. Seriously, 10 seconds.

And then the text of my message was this.

Hi Bob, no need to meet if we don't need to. But I was just wondering how it's going. Can you reply back with a number one, all is good with the current situation. No need to meet. Two, let's meet soon to discuss something else. Three, Yikes. How soon can we get on a teams call? Best Janel.

And his response, which came within the hour: Taking more than 10 seconds to let you know just how much I love this email. Number one, for now, I'd appreciate it if you circle back in two weeks.

So he didn't need to meet. Now, why did that simple three option email land so well with a busy executive? And why did he praise it? Not just to respond to it, but even to praise it and to ask me to send him more email in two weeks. I mean, nobody wants more email, but he wanted me to send him another email in two weeks. So in this episode, we're going to unpack this. We're going to take it apart like a user experience case study, because the ingredients that made it work are absolutely replicable. You can absolutely use the UX thinking that this email demonstrates with your team, with your clients, with your volunteers, your board members, or anyone whose time is stretched thin that you are emailing. So there are six reasons that this worked so well, and I'm going to deconstruct this using user experience principles.

So number one, it reduced cognitive load. Now, executives are constantly triaging, they're taking in information and they're trying to make decisions quickly, decide what needs further analysis and so on. And so they're taking things in at a high velocity. Now, which email needs my attention? Which one can I skim? And which one do I need to forward on to somebody else so that I can delegate it? So executive's cognitive bandwidth is already strained. Now, my email didn't ask him to think, not at all. I asked him to choose. And there is a world of difference between thinking and responding from that thoughtful place and just simply making a choice. And research backs this up. Cognitive load theory, which you may have heard me talk about here on the podcast, already shows that people will respond faster and more favorably when the mental cost of a response is low. A numbered list turns a potentially open ended question into a simple decision tree.

Instead of me asking him to tell me how things are going, which requires some internal debrief because he has to bring himself up to speed on that and then he has to synthesize it and then he has to actually craft the email to me, that requires some emotional reflection, maybe even guilt about not updating me sooner, all the things that would add cognitive load. But I gave him this pick 1, 2 or 3. So it's the difference between an essay question on an exam and a multiple choice question. Which one would you rather answer? I thought so. So this also reduces cognitive friction because it's just a multiple choice question. And so again, cognitive load zero cognitive friction. Zero multiple choice question. Easy to answer.

All right, number two, it was disarmingly polite in that matter. So short emails are notorious for coming across as abrupt or even rude. I mean, remember the last time you opened somebody's very short, terse email, like, acknowledged, and that was it? Yeah. A lot of times we interpret that curseness, that brevity to be rudeness. And there's a bunch of research that backs this up as well. So when written messages are brief, people often infer a negative tone that the sender never even intended. In some studies, recipients rated short, factual emails as annoying, or that the author was annoyed at the time or rushed when they sent it, or even angry when none of that was actually present. Okay, so my email totally bypassed this trap.

Why? Because I was short and I was warm. Hi, Bob. Okay, there's a salutation at the beginning of the email, and then the very first thing I say is, no need to meet if we don't need to. Okay, so I'm giving him an out. Right out of the gate, giving him an out. And then my question with its multiple choice, and then the closing, just wondering how it's going. Best, Janel. Okay, so these little relational cues softened the message.

They signaled, I see you, I respect your time. I'm not demanding anything. It's the difference between, can you give me a status update versus a quick check in. Hey, how are things going? Okay, the first one feels like your boss checking up on you. The second one feels like a partner supporting you. So just that little bit of warmth made all the difference in terms of how my message landed.

Okay, three. It created psychological safety by me giving him three numbered options. Now, we don't usually think of a numbered list as something that creates safety. Mine did exactly that. It reduced the risk of him putting anything in writing. Now, as I mentioned, this was a high stakes situation, and both he and his organization were better protected if there was not an email trail on this issue. Now, don't worry, nothing illegal was happening, but I really can't say more than that. But it was low risk in terms of him responding back without having to provide any additional detail about the situation. So low risk concerning the topic, and it was also low risk for him personally and emotionally. So option number one.

One said, hey, if things are good, that's great. Sure wouldn't mean to me, you're good. Option two said, hey, if there's something else you want to talk about, that's perfectly acceptable too. You're good. And number three said, hey, if It's a hot mess. You can totally admit that safely because I already normalized that for you as an option. It's hot mess. So I gave him permission to be in any one of these three states, successful, uncertain, or curious about something else, or totally overwhelmed by this situation without any judgment whatsoever on my part.

And executives rarely get that. Usually they get, hey, are we okay? Is this project on the rails? In a tone that implies that the answer must be yes. But my structure said, hey, all answers are valid and it's okay if you're a hot mess or if this situation is a hot mess. I mean, I wasn't necessarily accusing him of being a hot mess or suggesting he might be in a hot mess. The situation itself might have been in a hot mess. So all of the answers were valid. None of them made him feel bad. No wonder he loved it.

Number four, this email respected his time right there in the subject line itself. And again, my subject line. Super quick check in. Seriously, 10 seconds. And this is UX thinking at its best. Executives and of course the rest of us too, decide whether to open an email primarily based on the subject line and of course, whoever the sender is. But here's the thing. Research shows that when you set expectations, like in this case, the expectation I was setting. 10 seconds. When you set those expectations, will people relax? They trust you. They know they won't be pulled into a long scroll or a document or a rabbit hole or some big snarly thing they need to fix. I didn't just tell them it would be fast, I quantified it. And that's a pattern that's used in everything from advertising, say 50% off sale, to behavioral nudges like fill out this two minute survey. When you quantify how long something is going to take somebody, it reduces anxiety, it sets expectations, and especially if it is a reduction in time or a small amount of time, again, it is going to make the person that much more open to reading the email and in this case even responding. So he opened it because I told him it would be painless. And then I delivered on that promise.

I absolutely delivered on that promise. Number five, it was designed for a stressed user in an uncertain environment. And this is where UX thinking really shines. Again, I adapted my communication to the context. So this was an unusual situation. It was an unusual context for he and I to be coaching in. And by all means, it was an unusual context for him to be dealing with in his role. It's a high pressure situation and me coaching him in that situation.

Was also, this is a high pressure coaching assignment for me as well, because we just don't want this one to go off the off the rails for his sake, for his organization's sake, and, you know, selfishly for my continued engagement with both he and his organization. So this situation also had a high emotional load. This was a lot for him to carry in this uncertain and highly ambiguous situation that he was in. It was a disrupted routine. There were a lot of possible unknowns in this situation. There was a potential for embarrassment for him. I mean, not necessarily in the situation itself, but if it had gone off the rails and he needed to reach out to me and he hadn't, that could have potentially been embarrassing. So if things had already gone sideways and he should have reached out to me earlier, that could have been a potential for embarrassment for him.

But my message met him exactly where he was. It wasn't a template, it was just a thoughtful design choice on my part. So just like with product design, the closer you align to the user's real experience, the more likely you are to get positive engagement. And that's exactly what I got, is positive engagement. In fact, he responded faster and with more depth than I thought he was going to. And number six, I created a clear and easy call to action. So a call to action, or sometimes referred to as a CTA by its three letter acronym, is under discussed in internal communication. So what I mean by that is, inside of an organization, we don't necessarily talk about call to action.

We talk about call to action as something we want our customers to do. But I think it matters just as much inside of an organization. So it's used a lot in marketing. So a call to action would be, you know, click here to sign up and subscribe to this thing today, or go, you know, stop in your local store and buy this product today because it's on sale. Okay. My email's call to action was obvious. Just reply with a number, 1, 2 or 3. Like literally, I was not expecting a sentence.

I was not expecting a greeting or a salutation to me, I was just expecting to receive a 1, a 2, or a 3 and that I would know what to do do with that. One, he doesn't need to meet, I don't need to do anything. Two, he wants to meet, but about something else. Then I reach out to his admin and schedule some time against his calendar or three, things are a hot mess. And then I'm absolutely, probably not even emailing his admin. I'm getting on the phone with his Admin to set up a time to meet as soon as possible. Okay, so he just needed to reply back with a number, a one, a two or three. No scrolling, because all of my message fit on the screen, even if he was reading it on a mobile device.

So no scrolling, no ambiguity, no analysis. He knew also which one of those three things he needed. Now, when your call to action is incredibly clear, your response rate is going to go up dramatically. And the people at Basecamp, the project management software, once wrote about getting a 90% increase in responses simply by making the call to action blunt and obvious to their users. So this email did exactly that and it removed any friction of getting a response. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. Now, I said six, but I'm going to give you a couple of bonus ones. Okay? Number seven.

I built trust by signaling partnership, not pressure. So the line no need to meet if we don't need to was pure trust building. It gave him an out and he didn't even have to do anything except reply back with one if that was his choice. It gave him all the control. It communicated that I'm not trying to squeeze you in, put you on my schedule, have another session with him, monitor the situation. None of that. It framed me as a resource, not a requirement, and it put again, all of the control in his hands. Now, autonomy is one of the biggest drivers of trust in user experience and in leadership and of course, in coaching relationships.

And this message gave him all of the autonomy right up front. He was clearly in the driver's seat. And finally, number eight, it made follow up easier for both of us. His reply said it all. I would appreciate another email in about two weeks. Now, why did he ask me for more email? Again, who wants more email? Nobody wants more email. He did, because my email created a system and he was putting another loop into that feedback structure into that system. So this was a quick, low friction, low effort mechanism for staying connected.

During his uncertainty, he did not necessarily know what things were going to look like in two weeks. Now, I put a note then in my calendar to follow up with him in two weeks. And in two weeks I sent him pretty much the exact same email circling back, do you want to A, meet on this, B, meet on something, or A, we don't need to meet, B, meet on something else, or C, yes, please, let's meet on this specific issue now. Again, I didn't just send an email. And that follow up wasn't just another email. It was a communication loop designed to make him feel supported without Being crowded or without feeling pressured. And that took minimal effort for him to respond to. Okay, now I want to turn the tables back for you and give you some specific actionable things that you can do to write your own perfect quick check in emails.

So I'm going to give you some specific takeaways that you can put into practice to do basically the same thing that I did without exactly copying my message because it's not a template. I was thoughtfully addressing the situation not only that he was in, but also that we were together in, in an executive coaching relationship. So what can you do to write your own perfect quick check in email? Okay, here are your takeaways. Number one, use the subject line to promise brevity. So quick status, 10 second check in, one word answer required, something like that. So that the person knows that this is a brief email requiring a very brief response. Now let me just ask you as the user, when you open up your email and you see something where it you have a relationship with the person who's on the other side of that email with the sender and they're giving you the parameters, this is going to be a short email and it's going to require a very short response from you. I bet that those are the ones that you want to take care of first because every time we can check something off our list, we feel a little bit better.

So when you see one of those in your email and it's likely even if you respond first in, first out to your emails, it's likely you will skip over some things and go straight to that one because you know you can knock it off your list right away. Okay, so number one, use the subject line to promise brevity. Number two, offer multiple choice replies. Three options, five options, maybe two options, yes or no. You know, one for yes, two for no. I mean, don't even make them type out the words yes or no. ABC 1, 2, 3. Okay, but we're going to number these things and we're going to number or letter whichever one you prefer, but give a small number of options.

Again, the smaller the number of the options, the less the cognitive load. So don't give them 24 options. You've maybe heard about the jam study where a in a grocery store. And this was a research project designed to find out how people make decisions. So imagine a free tasting of some jams in a grocery store. So the jam display is set up and in one version of the study they're testing three jams. And so you know, you can try grape, strawberry, or cherry. And then they're looking to see how many customers bought one of those types of jams.

And then they did it again. But they did it with 24 jams. And overwhelmingly they sold way more jam with the promotion of just sampling three compared to when they gave all 24 flavors that this company makes as choices. So people get overwhelmed when there are too many choices. So offering multiple choice replies with a relatively small number of choices is a great way to drive response and to keep that in to keep the information moving quickly. Okay, so that was number two, offer multiple choice replies.

Number three, remove the emotional labor. So normalize all possible answers ahead of time. Make it safe to say it's not okay. Because one of the answers is this thing's a hot mess. At least that's what it was for me. I didn't call it a hot mess, but you know, things are going sideways or I didn't even say things are going sideways. Just like let's hop on a teams call as soon as possible. Believe it was. Yikes, let's hop on a teams call asap.

Okay, so number three is remove the emotional labor. And in so doing, you're taking the guilt out of it. You're taking any yucky feelings out of it. And I mean, I had a personal relationship working with this person so my sense of humor could come through. And I encourage you when you're doing this, take into context the relationship you have with the other person. And if you can use a little humor or something to lighten it a little bit to make the, the yikes, that's not okay. Answer a possibility that again, it's going to reduce the emotional labor for the the recipient. And number four, keep the tone warm even when the content is short. A greeting, a polite phrase, a friendly sign off.

Again, these are the things that are missing when people find short emails to be rude. So keep your tone warm even when the content is short. And number five, give one of the options to be that there's no pressure or state explicitly no pressure to respond. So no need to reply with detail, no need for us to meet unless it's helpful. So really taking that pressure off by labeling it as there is no pressure here. And again, you want to do that in a warm tone. Okay, so number five, state that there is no pressure. Number six, design your communication based on the other person's cognitive bandwidth.

So we already talked about cognitive load a little bit. But remember, if they are stressed or overloaded, you want to reduce the load for them. You do not want to show up as one more thing stressing them out or one more thing that's going to be added to their to do list. Because I would have hated for by email to go on his to do list of, you know, compose an answer to Janelle, compose a status update for me. I did not want a status update. I did not need a status update. And we were going to address that in our coaching call anyway. Okay? And then lastly, number seven, use brevity as kindness.

It's not a blunt instrument. So the distinction here is the difference between rude and respectful. So when you're packaging things with salutations, when you're signing off with your name and maybe you know best or Walmart guards or you know, hope all is well with you, something like that, that brevity is going to be interpreted as kindness. When we are too brief and we leave off all of those salutations and all of those kind words, that's when we're more likely to come across as rude. Okay, so before I close out this episode and you stop listening, I want you to think about this. Think about one person that you've been meaning to follow up with, colleague, a direct report, a client, boss, maybe even friend, and send them a quick three sentence email or three option, not three sentence email, but a three option email. Just a quick check in and this could even be to a friend. Hey, haven't heard from you in a while.

Number one, you're great, but really busy. Number two, we need to check in. Number three, you're a hot mess and really busy or something like that. Okay, but keep it warm, keep it brief and it might make them think of your email as the best one that they've ever received or the best one that they've received all day. You might be surprised at how fast they reply as well and how much they appreciate the clarity and the kindness that's baked into your message. So it takes a little bit of thought to write an email like this. It would have been easier by far for me to say, Bob, give me a quick status update when you have a minute. And again, then I would have ended up on his to do list.

But I took the time to think about his context, what's going on in his world, and I crafted a message that made it very easy for him to reply. So I want you to take this on. This week we all have at least one person in our orbit where we are wanting to get an answer back from them about something. So I want you to give this a try. And for extra credit. Let me know how it goes. Hit me up on social media. You can find the social media links to my to all my channels on the show notes page for this.

And this is episode 245. So it would be janelanderson.com/245. All right. So give it a try and let me know how it goes until we next week, my friends, be well.