Emails are effective, instantaneous forms of communication, but its important to be careful of what you send and who you send it to. From a simple joke shared with a colleague to a real breach of privacy, making a mistake by email can haunt you for years to come. Take these few easy precautions to avoid making an embarrassing or potentially career-ending gaffe:

Double-check recipients before pressing send. Weve all accidentally sent an email to the wrong person before. Autopopulate functionality is extremely helpful, but it can also wreak havoc by popping in a recipients email address thats awfully close to the one of the person youre actually trying to reach. Always make sure the email address is correct before sending.

Draft it then delete it. Venting to a colleague? Sending an off-color joke to a friend? Indulging in a little “harmless” gossip? Stop and think it over before you press send. Try imagining what might transpire if the wrong person read that email. If thats a terrifying thought, delete the email ASAP. You dont want to suffer from senders remorse or risk serious repercussions.

Be wary of Reply All. Sometimes, we think were sending a private remark to the sender of the email, neglecting to realize that theres 10 people ccd and weve just hit Reply All. Take the time to make sure you indeed want to respond to everyone in a group email. If you only want to respond to one person or exclude someone from the group, the safest thing to do is start a fresh email altogether.

Use your private email for private stuff. No matter who you work for, it’s never a good practice to use your work email for private correspondence and your private email to send work-related information. Separating the personal from the professional is always the way to go.

Practicing these common-sense habits will keep your correspondence squeaky clean and help you avoid a communications snafu. Happy emailing!

Published with permission from RISMedia.