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Email has gotten a lot of flack for making phone and face-to-face conversations, which are naturally more “personal”, obsolete.  I strongly believe, however, that each still has its own place in the business world, and each is used to accomplish very different things.  I would even go on to argue that email has singlehandedly made business more polite and efficient.

When you are sent a professional email, you’re really being done a favor.  The sender is basically saying, “I could call you and you would have to talk to me NOW or you can look at this email, react however you want to, gather your thoughts, and respond on your own time.”  Additionally, what an email does, as opposed to a phone call or a meeting, is allow you to make better decisions without wasting people’s time.  Back in the day, when someone had to call you with a problem, you’d have to give an answer to that person immediately or ask them to hold or to call back.  There’s something very unsatisfying about that to the caller.  Now, if that person were to send you an email instead, you can do your homework and respond once with an educated answer. And, since the sender accepts that he’s sending you an email that he has no control over after its left his outbox, he’s not going to be disappointed if you don’t respond within the next 10 seconds (unless he’s one of those people that hit “refresh” on their inbox every 5 seconds…).

For those and many more reasons, people feel insulted when you simply ignore their emails (that are actually waiting on your reply).  The thought that goes through the sender’s mind is, “dammit, I was trying to not waste your time in scheduling a meeting because I know you’re busy but now you’re forcing my hand.  #Lose.”  So, when you think you’re too busy to answer a solitary email, just think of how much busier you’re going to get when that person stops being respectful of your time and starts demanding answers.

Therefore, do yourself and everyone a favor and answer your G-damn email.