The other week, much to my surprise, an e-mail arrived in my inbox that shouldn’t have.
It was a note from a fairly prominent Ottawa business owner who was, it appeared, planning on selling the operation. The e-mail was to a potential investor and a third-party accountant, and contained several juicy details on what appeared to be a pending transaction.
This was serious, serious stuff, and certainly something you don’t want to erroneously place in the hands of your local business press – unless you want to (and if that’s the case, my e-mail address is at the foot of this page).
OBJ360 (Sponsored)
How the uOttawa faculty of engineering instills an ‘entrepreneurial mindset’ in students
A decade ago, Terrafixing chief operating officer Vida Gabriel was a chemistry-loving student in high school with little to no interest in business or entrepreneurship. “I didn’t like the sales
The Ottawa Hospital’s Campaign to Create Tomorrow enters important next phase
For Ginger Bertrand, some of her earliest childhood memories in Ottawa are centred around healthcare. “I grew up across the street from what was originally the General Hospital,” she explains,
The really remarkable thing, though, is that it’s not the first time this has happened to me recently. Not by a long shot.
Why, just two weeks prior, pretty much the same thing occured – this time it was an executive at a well-known local firm that sent me a mistaken missive, containing yet more details on what looked like another pending transaction.
A few months ago, again, I received a mistaken and very sensitive e-mail from another nameless businessperson.
I didn’t use any of the coughed-up information in any of these cases, and I think it was the right decision. After sending a polite reply to each of the senders, in most cases I received a very relieved “thank you” note.
But the incidents illustrate quite vividly the potential pitfalls of modern e-mail technology, and how the seemingly innocuous click of a mouse can have serious and potentially hellish implications.
E-mail address auto-complete, for instance – which has nearly gotten me in trouble a couple times – is a big one, especially for busy people who may hit “send” without thinking twice.
And I get chills even thinking about the potential mishaps lurking behind the dreaded “send all” button.
Indeed, we’re all guilty of making e-mail blunders of varying magnitudes at one time or another, as a national survey released in late 2009 by staffing agency The Creative Group revealed. In it, nearly eight of every ten advertising and marketing executives admitted they’d made a major goof-up at least once during their e-mailing careers.
When put to the question, “Have you ever mistakenly e-mailed someone the wrong message or copied someone on a message without intending to?”, 78 per cent of respondents surveyed said “yes.”
Which is why it’s so interesting that Google recently announced a new Gmail feature allowing hapless mailers to cancel delivery of messages up to 30 seconds after clicking “send” (Gmail has included a ‘cancel send’ feature for a while, but never for a 30 second period).
It’s a fairly obvious and very handy feature that many e-mail services, quite frankly, ignore. Perhaps its another example of Google’s ability to listen to the marketplace – albeit a slightly embarrased one.
Certainly, the new feature will likely save face for more than a few folks.
Although, unlike the unfortunate senders I’d mentioned above, I suppose you’d still have to realize you’ve made a mistake in the first place.
jim.donnelly@transcontinental.ca
