In-House Counsel

Why Are You Pestering Me?

Advice from in-house counsel Mark Herrmann on how to avoid wasting senior executives' time over email.

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If you’re writing an email to a senior executive, assume that the senior executive receives your email with one thought in mind:  “Why are you pestering me?”

Thus: There are many, many things happening in the company.  The senior executive expects to hear important messages from the folks who report to him or her.   The senior executive just barely recognizes your name, since you’re just a cog in the wheel of the legal department.  And the executive now has to deal with this email from legal.  Does the executive really have to read it, and think about it, and maybe take some action?  Why are you pestering me?

That knowledge — that senior folks aren’t really delighted to hear from you — controls the words that you write.

You could write this to the CEO: “I’m writing to alert you to a small litigation matter involving BigCo.  A BigCo employee was crossing the street, was hit by a truck, and suffered $20,000 in injuries.  Two witnesses say the light was red when the employee crosses the street; one says the light was green. . . . “

You lose.

You flunk the “why are you pestering me” test.

The CEO has read the first paragraph or two of the email, and the CEO doesn’t know why you sent the message, what you’d like the CEO to do, or why the company employs fools such as you.

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Not good.

How should you have written the email?

To explain, as quickly as possible, why you’re pestering the CEO.

Don’t beat around the bush with stuff that matters to you.  Tell the CEO why you’re occupying the CEO’s time.  Write this: “The CEO of an important client, BigCo, will be calling you within the next day or two.  I’m writing so that you won’t be surprised by that call.

“Here’s the situation in a nutshell:  There’s a small litigation matter . . . . “

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Oh!

What’s the CEO’s thought process?  “I received an email from someone whose name I barely recognize.  Why’s that person pestering me?  Oooh.  The CEO of BigCo will be calling me in a few days.  I’d better be ready for that call!  It’s a good thing that I received this email.  Let me find out what this is all about and thank the intelligent person who sent me this email for warning me.”

Remember: The two messages that I’ve described are exactly the same.  They will convey precisely the same facts.

But one buries the lede, waiting until deep in the body of the email to explain why the email is on the recipient’s desk.

And the other puts the lede up front, where it belongs, so the CEO isn’t mentally cursing the writer for a few paragraphs, or deleting the email unread.

Don’t think that you matter.

Think that people receive your emails by asking: “Why are you pestering me?”

Answer that question first.

Only then may you continue with the rest of your message.

Mark Herrmann spent 17 years as a partner at a leading international law firm and is now deputy general counsel at a large international company. He is the author of The Curmudgeon’s Guide to Practicing Law and Inside Straight: Advice About Lawyering, In-House And Out, That Only The Internet Could Provide (affiliate links). You can reach him by email at inhouse@abovethelaw.com.

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