Have you ever thought about how much time you spend on emails at work? New research suggests it’s probably longer than you think. A survey of 8-thousand small business employees finds they write an average of 112 emails a week, spending a little more than five and a half (5.8) minutes on each one.
That adds up to 10 hours and 47 minutes a week just writing emails, and it turns out, a lot of them aren’t even being read by their recipients. Respondents admit they delete or otherwise don’t read an email based only on the subject line eight times a day, on average. And that’s led nearly half (45%) of them to miss a meeting, deadline or something else work-related.
The poll also reveals:
- Respondents think their emails are only fully read and understood by the recipients 36% of the time.
- That may be why respondents say it’s common to get an email response that doesn’t answer their questions (62%), addresses them by the wrong name (51%) or asks a question they just answered (49%).
- The workers surveyed admit they’re also guilty of not reading emails, with 57% confessing that if an email is “too long” - eight or more sentences - they don’t bother reading the whole thing.
- Nearly half (46%) say email is an “outdated form of communication.”
- Top frustrations of using email include important emails going to spam or junk folders (53%), inbox getting clogged with emails that aren’t relevant to them (50%), it’s easy to misinterpret tone in emails (47%), there’s an expectation of staying “formal” (45%) and not being able to remove themselves from email chains (29%).
- Almost half of those surveyed (49%) would like their company to transition from email to other forms of communication.
Source: SWNS Digital