Four multi-coloured envelopes
Emails are one of our key communication tools, but there is always the risk that they may be misunderstood. When sending emails across cultures, that risk is amplified. Here are eight tips to help you craft effective cross-cultural emails.
We all want to be seen as clear and effective communicators—it's an essential part of being a professional. With the average American knowledge worker receiving about 120 emails per day, email dominates our business communications. Email is especially useful in communicating with colleagues, customers and business partners worldwide, helping shrink the distances that global work brings.
But even more so than with emails sent to local colleagues, emails sent across cultures are ripe for miscommunication. When dealing with a different culture, the risk—and impact—of misunderstanding gets amplified.
Overcoming this risk requires the right mindset, cultural awareness and being intentional in crafting emails sent across cultures.
Cultivate a mindset of self-awareness and cultural awareness
The key to effective cross-cultural communication is to think from the perspective of the other party. Keeping your listeners in mind is vital in all communication, but when working with other cultures, we run the risk of imposing our cultural norms and values, which can be interpreted very differently by those from different cultures. So, drop your assumptions and common sense about how to communicate. Think from the viewpoint of the recipient and their culture and how your email will sound to them. Learn about the recipient's culture and how they communicate. Identify what is similar to how you communicate in your culture—which you can build on—and what is different, to avoid potential landmines.
Be sensitive to gender, names and titles
If you're sending a first email to someone from a different culture, don’t assume their gender from their name or other information. Might they identify as a different gender? Similarly, will your gender be clear to them from your name?
To keep things clear, include the pronouns that you want to be identified by, e.g., "she/her" or “Mr., Ms., Mx.” in your email signature block. This shows the email recipient the courtesy of not having to guess your gender or making a mistake when addressing you. They can do likewise when replying. Until you know how the recipient likes being addressed, refer to them by their full name to avoid giving offense or appearing too casual. Consider spelling your name phonetically in your email signature block, to help colleagues pronounce it correctly.
If your counterpart has a title, like Doctor, play it safe and use that title in your emails until they say not to. In very hierarchical cultures, titles mean a lot, and not using them can offend.
Know how widely to CC
In collectivist or consensus-based cultures —Japan is a good example of both—we need to involve more players in decisions, which extends to who gets CC'ed on the email. Expect longer recipient lists when working with such cultures.
When working with strongly hierarchical cultures, be extra sensitive about whom to include on the email distribution list. Leaving off someone who is part of a reporting chain may be seen as a slight against them.
Understand how logic varies across cultures
Different cultures have different approaches to how they structure arguments and use logic to persuade. When typing an email, think about whether you always put the main idea first or put it later in the email after giving background and supporting information. A headline-first approach is standard in North America, but it can fail in cultures that want to know why before they hear what and how. Understand how you may need to change how you structure your emails based on the recipient's culture.
Adopt the right level of formality
If the email recipient's culture is very hierarchical, then seniority and power distance have a huge impact. Consider your position in the hierarchy relative to the email recipient. If they're above you in the hierarchy, adopt a formal and respectful tone. If you're above them, then a more informal tone should work.
If you and your email recipient are at the same level in the hierarchy, be sensitive to anything in the email which could be read as exerting power over them. We all dislike being bossed around by those with no authority, but this gets magnified in hierarchical cultures.
Low-context communication always wins
In high-context cultures—think Brazil, China, or India—a lot is communicated between the lines or by what is not being said. Cultures like Canada, the USA or Australia tend to be low-context, with the words and ideas speaking for themselves.
While it's hard for people from a high-context culture to operate in a low-context environment, it is much harder for low-context cultures to go high-context. So in cross-cultural emails, it's better to go low-context and err on including more information and being more explicit in what you're asking for.
Be sensitive to directness
Cultures vary in how directly or indirectly they communicate, especially when it comes to disagreement or debate. An email reply that sounds angry or abrupt may simply be typical for colleagues from a more direct culture. Give your counterpart the benefit of the doubt, and consider how they might have intended the message. Your emails may come off the same way to a colleague from a more indirect culture, where disagreement is less open. Think about your cultural norms when it comes to directness in the emails you send.
Know when not to email
With some cultures and in some situations, communication simply works better face to face or over video. In high-context or more expressive cultures, body language and other non-verbal communication carry a bigger weight. If the discussion topic is sensitive, email may not be the best way to get your points across.
How you email is part of your personal brand, and in a globalized workplace, you want to be known as someone who is alert to cultural sensitivities and knows how to communicate across cultures. With a bit of thought about your emails, you will be seen as someone who knows how to avoid cross-cultural hiccups and can leverage the diversity inherent in global teams, to create value and success.
