Good Articles on E-Mail Fundamentals for Construction Professionals

E-mail forms a significant portion of the documentation available for a construction project, particularly when resolving a dispute. Most, if not all, of my cases involving construction issues like the scope-of-work, delays, and defects have relied heavily on the e-mail communications sent before, during, and after the dispute arose.

Gene Heady with Smith Currie & Hancock LLP posted a good article making some helpful recommendations for the use of e-mail by construction professionals during a construction project, including:

1. Avoid using foul language, sarcasm or off-color humor.
2. Keep your e-mails simple.
3. Give facts not opinions.
4. Avoid being self-critical in internal e-mail communications.
5. When upset or angry, rigorously adhere to the 24-hour rule.
6. Use the Subject line to quickly and accurately convey the substance of the e-mail.
7. Only discuss one project in each e-mail.
8. Follow-up important e-mails with letters.
9. Assume deletion of e-mail will not prevent its later recovery.
10. Maintain privileged nature of attorney-client communications.

The entire article is well worth a read, along with a recent companion article from Lee Schumacher at ARCADIS which makes some additional suggestions.

Thanks to ARCADIS for bringing this to our attention through their Construction Claims Blog.