| Should I add kisses to my posts to make me more likeable?? xx Posted by grahame at 07:49, 15th December 2025 |     |
From The BBC
At first glance, my emails are polite and warm, after all "I'm just checking" in on a deadline but "no worries either way".
However, a closer look reveals my messages are punctuated by unnecessary apologies, smiley faces, exclamation marks and even kisses.
I like to think I'm being friendly and approachable, but according to experts, these linguistic habits may be quietly undermining how seriously I'm taken at work.
Careers coach Hannah Salton and etiquette coach William Hanson explain why so many of us write like this and the impact it could be having on how we're perceived, and even promoted at work.
However, a closer look reveals my messages are punctuated by unnecessary apologies, smiley faces, exclamation marks and even kisses.
I like to think I'm being friendly and approachable, but according to experts, these linguistic habits may be quietly undermining how seriously I'm taken at work.
Careers coach Hannah Salton and etiquette coach William Hanson explain why so many of us write like this and the impact it could be having on how we're perceived, and even promoted at work.
In a vein of self-analysis, this has me asking "Do you take me (personally) seriously?" Let me say the same thing twice:
There is a lot of sense in the article (yes, I have read it fully) and much more too in terms of making the language and presentation followable and organising it to have the headlines bubble to the top rather than being lost in the content and also reading it back and smell checking!!
There is a lot of sense in the article. I go further, checking that my language and presentation are followable. I organise my headlines to bubble to the top. I read back and spell checking.
This is a "Coffee Shop" post. I post official information and authoritative answers. I also post comment, thoughts, ideas that are way out, and perhaps too often try to make jokes. I'm not sure I always get it right - but I certainly think about what I am posting and very much enjoy the way this place is a mix from very serious stuff to banter amongst friends. Long may it continue.
| Re: Should I add kisses to my posts to make me more likeable?? xx Posted by Mark A at 09:11, 15th December 2025 | |
Astute observation: people pick this up in school and higher education and many other places as they move between different environments - recognising the appropriate register for a situation so that they don't say submit a 1st year undergraduate essay peppered with phrases as though they'd typed it on their phone (bit of an extreme example). Then, people in organisations sometimes settle into funny ways, especially when they have to work with a script-driven set of phrases for communication, which gives us the lego-block-like messaging to the public from the rail industry, or the weird bonkerness of BBC continuity fillers.
Mark
