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.
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
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.
It is a sad state but it’s like the weather, you can complain about it or dress for it.
I enjoy raging against it.
Good point, I rant about winter all the time.
… Or both?
Why make a false dichotomy out of it?
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.
The person that inspired this message will never change. You have to treat them as if you were a lawyer, and they are a hostile witness. Ask them one question, then follow up with another, until you have your answers. Problem is, they will probably catch on pretty quick and leave you unanswered.
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.
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.
In the US it’s probably because literacy and reading comprehension is the lowest it’s been since the 80s.
Human communication isn’t perfect. Some people have too many emails. Others need cues only audio visual interaction can provide to quickly parse info.
Use numbering, paragraphs etc.
Its their responsibility to read shit but its yours to be clear and concise.
Big shout out for enumerating questions. Makes it clear you need an answer for each one. Makes it easier to follow up if you need more info on a particular question. Makes it easier to pester the person with “hey, I need an answer to 2 by EOD or project deadlines will be significantly impacted” (copied to your PM).
People’s poor reading comprehension is annoying. But the right move is to do everything you can to get the answers you need, creating a polite paper trail as you go. Usually the other person will get you the info you need sooner if you pester them enough, with the implied threat that you are building a case against them if the project is delayed. Because if they don’t answer your questions in a timely fashion when you do everything possible to get the answers you need, it is their fault.
It annoys the heck out of me too. Generally what I do is reply with the remaining questions they haven’t answered; sometimes they get the message and answer all of them, sometimes we go round and round until I have all the answers I need.
I work in IT so for the most part, if I have 5 questions, that’s because there are 5 things I need to know. And I need to know because they want me to solve their problem, so if they want to do this one question at a time that’s fine, but if I start out going one at a time I get complained at for being too slow.
I’ve also tried everything I can think of short of being explicitly rude in my messages. Numbering them doesn’t work. Bullet-points don’t work. One question per paragraph doesn’t work. Asking them explicitly to answer all questions doesn’t work (how did these people ever pass an exam?).
(And yes I’m aware I haven’t answered all your questions (-: )
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.
It’s a mixture of stupidity and laziness.
Bad reading comprehension
