Rule of the day: CC and BCC netiquette rules

Netiquette rules – etiquette and rules of email – should be fairly easy to follow although it’s also easy for people to become lazy with email. Writing emails in ALL CAPS or without proper punctuation is something we’ve probably seen and we all know someone who feels the need to add a LOL or smiley face on every line that they type.

When it comes to netiquette rules related to your job searches and career in general, I always put it this way: Everything you type and send to someone who can influence your career can and probably will be judged by the person or people receiving it.

In that regard, emails, resumes, cover letters, etc should all be written with the goal of sending them with no grammatical or spelling errors and they should always be written professionally with the target audience in mind.

One area that often gets neglected by job searchers is the actual sending part of the email process. I have lost count of the number of emails from job searchers that I’ve deleted without reading when I see multiple names in the “To”, “Cc” and/or “Bcc” sections.

In other words, they’ve sent their resume to me – and to a dozen or more other recruiters whose email addresses are visible in the address bar – and expect that I’ll be interested to help them out with their job search knowing that a dozen or more other people are doing the same.

Sometimes they send their resume to me and to one or more of my colleagues at the same company, too. Typically, you only need to work with one recruiter per company. Perhaps they think that we’ll fight it out and see which one of us will help them with their job search. Usually, we fight to see which one of us will delete the email faster.

When I see I’ve received the same email that multiple other recruiters have, I delete it without reading it. What’s the point in working with this person if they are also working with a bunch of other recruiters who in many cases are working on the same jobs I am?

It’s a waste of my time and shows that the person sending the email doesn’t understand netiquette rules.

Using a small number of recruiters for your job search certainly makes sense but it doesn’t mean we need to know about all the other recruiters you’re working with. The more you indicate that you’re working with a large number of recruiters, the less likely I’m going to work with you.

Tags: netiquette, professional email etiquette, Rule of the Day