Dear Waiting for the Ax:

Before you spread paranoia, consider a few things. One, you don't know the whole story. You heard something from one person who probably doesn't know all the details of the circumstances. Second, perhaps the firing was justified. Or the e-mail may have been a final straw. There could have been a string of events that had already occurred. So don't create problems for yourself by jumping to conclusions about a single event.

This is, though, a good time to evaluate your e-mail communications. I find that most people need to fine tune the attitude their e-mails convey. They can be caustic, curse and easily misunderstood.

People express themselves differently online, says Thomas Weber in a "Wall Street Journal" article. In 1986 when Lee Sproull and Sara Kiesler published "Reducing Social Context Dues: Electronic Mail in Organizational Communication", it recognized that "e-mail is often written in a conversational style but lacks the clues that tone of voice and facial expressions provide," he says.

This is such an issue that David Kaufer, head of the English department at Pittsburgh's Carnegie Mellon University, has helped create Moodwatch. It's "an emotional spellchecker that scans for vitriol instead of typos." It looks for intimidating words and phrases, "bad" words, a lot of sentences with "you" that could suggest an attack on the recipient, opinionated declarations such as "That's a stupid idea," denials such as "I'm not about to…" and comments such as "Why is everyone…"

As you're writing, if your words put you in dangerous territory, a chili pepper icon shows up on your screen. This indicates you're "flaming," or trying to intimidate the reader. In essence, it makes you stop and look at what you've written to see how the receiver could take your message.

If you're concerned about how you're coming across, print out your e-mail before you send it. The printed word looks different on a piece of paper and can help you evaluate your tone.

Your company probably has a policy on e-mails. Check it out.

© by Andrea Kay

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