For example I’ll send an e-mail with 3 questions and will only get an answer to one of the questions. It’s worse when there are 2 yes/no questions with a question that is obviously not a yes/no question. Then I get a response of
Yes
back in the e-mail. So which question are they answering?
Mainly I’m asking all of you why do people insist on only answering 1 question out of an e-mail where there are multiple? Do people just not read? Are people that lazy? What is going on?
Edit at this point I’ve got the answers . Some are too lazy to actually read. Some admit they get focused on one item and forget to go back. I understand the second group. The first group yeah no excuse there.
Continuing edit: there are comments where people have tried the bullet points and they say it still doesn’t help. I might put the needed questions in red.
I usually number my questions, makes it more obvious
Yes.
“Do people just not read? Are people that lazy? What is going on?”
Not much, what is going on with you?
You can get mad at everyone else or you can start playing to the lowest common denominator.
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Question 1
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Question 2
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Question 3
I’ll do this and they STILL only answer the first question
Send separate emails. Schedule them 15 minutes apart.
This is so extra when motherfuckers could just read.
“Thank you for your answer to my first question. Could you please also address questions 2 and 3?”
At least by numbering the questions you make it easier to re-ask them.
Reply:
One down, two to go!
Tried that. Got the same result
this is the way. if you really want the highest chance of all questions being answered, number them.
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It’s not that they “insist” on not answering, they just have limited reading comprehension and/or attention span. With experience you learn to ask exactly one question in an email, and maybe you’ll get an answer some of the time, and if you’re lucky it will be coherent.
It really is a sad State of affairs that reading comprehension is so bad that people can’t answer questions in written form.
I mean it’s literally written down you can’t miss it.
And to clarify this is more of me complaining because I’ve experienced this a lot. It’s most apparent in online discussions, where seemingly a majority of what you say gets completely skipped missed or misinterpreted and replies often focus on just a couple words of your statement instead of understanding sometimes even just a whole paragraph.
if we’re referring to people in the U.S. it’s important to remember that over half of the population can’t read beyond a 6th grade level. That’s according to our own Former-Department of Education.
It is a sad state but it’s like the weather, you can complain about it or dress for it.
… Or both?
Why make a false dichotomy out of it?
I enjoy raging against it.
Good point, I rant about winter all the time.
try numbering them
OK, there are thousands, possibly millions of people who do this.
Reluctant upvote
Reading comprehension has gone down the tubes. I dunno if it’s from people watching too many TikToks and their attention span can’t handle reading more than one sentence anymore, or what, but I have definitely noticed a change in people’s ability to read and understand the content of what they just read.
Where I work, my old boss never wrote anything down, did not like to communicate via email, and insisted on phone calls/verbal meetings instead. When they announced they were taking a new job, we begged them to create an SOP of all the things they did with detailed instructions because NONE of it had ever been written down. We were told no, they couldn’t do that. No explanation other than “I can’t.” And I’m convinced that they simply couldn’t read, or could BARELY read.
So I created the SOP instead, detailed as hell, everything in one place. Sections, subsections, hyperlinks, it’s all there. 2 new employees come into the office, I’m supposed to train them. I do, and I show them the SOP, tell them “everything you need to know is in this SOP”, so that AFTER I train them, they can reference it.
They never reference it, ever. They ask me how to do the things they’ve forgotten instead. I just point them to the correct section in the SOP and tell them to read it. BUT THEY DON’T READ. It’s insane! How do they get by in life in general!?
You’re right. The illiteracy is everywhere. It’s a very troubling sign.
I wonder, were there any other points in history, post-literacy, where a significant amount of people went to school yet still lacked literacy skills? If it has happened, would it even be recorded? Or is this aspect of modern society truly novel?
It’d be nice to know how such a situation would’ve been rectified in the past, but I get the feeling the solution would be the same thing I’ve been calling for since my own childhood - a comprehensive public educational system with a focus on critical thinking.
It would be interesting to see if it’s ever happened in the past, for sure. I too assumed it was due to poor education, but the three people I mentioned (my old boss and the 2 new coworkers) all came from different areas of the U.S. and are each in different generations (1 Boomer, 1 Gen X, 1 Millennial), so they all have very different backgrounds/education experiences, yet they ALL struggle to read anything longer than a single sentence. It’s infuriating. I try to be patient, because hey, we all have our thing we suck at, but it’s honestly a little scary that they and so many other are out there not following directions simply because they can’t read them.
Been doing email since it began. Same frustrations.
Solutions (workarounds):
- Email is structured with “executive summary” & “detail”. That way I can write all the words I want but people can only read the first paragraph.
- Never ask questions. Tell them what I’m going to choose, & give them opportunity to disagree. That way if they don’t respond usefully I can take their “non-response” as a response & proceed anyway.
- If I need to ask a question, use a phone call or go to their desk, or (shudder) make a meeting.
For me? Usually it’s because answering the first question on the list took a lot of time, research, or mental energy and I had forgotten there were other questions by the time I finally had the answer written down. Sense of accomplishment, hit send.
In the US it’s probably because literacy and reading comprehension is the lowest it’s been since the 80s.
Poor reading comprehension skills are more prevalent than we think
The level of frustration from online discussions when the things you say are entirely missed or misinterpreted is a great example of this.
Even mildly complex topics that touch anything politically charged or emotionally charged tend to be subject to groupthink dynamics in a format where group think is largely just a result of poor reading comprehension.
No.
I will put 3 simple 1 sentence questions in a numbered list and get a single answer back.
Idgaf any more I just copy/paste the same 3 questions and send it back.
Bad reading comprehension
As others have suggested, in order to communicate effectively, you have to tailor your message to your audience. Dumb it down, break it down, shorten it, order questions from most to least important or most to least relevant to the recipient, or just badger them relentlessly with follow ups until you have the information you need and talk shit about them behind their back to any competent coworkers you have.
Regardless, they’re not going to just magically change, so it’s up to you to do something different if you want a different result than you’re getting now.
