Millie is excited. She wants to share her cat’s latest photo with the entire organization. She selects the “Everybody” email list and hits send.
“Aww. He’s so cute!” says Bobby.
“Look at those little whiskers” Sue replies.
And the responses keep coming… and coming…
Unfortunately, because we are a workplace, these responses are filling up Everybody’s email boxes and are weighing down our email server. People are missing legitimate emails – work time is being
How can this issue be avoided?
Well… maybe work email isn’t the best place to share cat photos.
In general, though, it is best to us BCC when sending emails to a large group of people.
What is BCC, you may ask? It is similar to the Carbon Copy (CC) line under the “To” field – but it’s a Blind Carbon Copy. This means that the email system, and the other receivers, are blind to any addresses/groups in this field.
Reasons to use BCC:
- To protect people’s email addresses/identities. (Maybe the president of the org doesn’t want everyone to know his personal email address.)
- To include administrators for added accountability (You may need backup in case you need to talk to Millie about her cat-photo-sending activities.)
- To protect receivers from accidentally replying to all. (It happens to the best of us.)
- To protect receivers from receiving a million “reply all’s” (Please… from someone who receives too many emails already… send your email responsibly.)
One thing to note: You must put something in the “To” field. I recommend putting your own email address on that line – then all of your friends can reply directly to you. (I’m looking at you, cat lovers.)