# Examples — Professional Email House Style

# Contents

• Subject-line pairs
• Complete worked example: request email (bad → house style)
• Complete worked example: bad-news email (bad → house style)
• Follow-up sequence without passive aggression
• Gotchas

# Subject-line pairs

# Complete worked example: request email

❌ Bad version (context-first, buried ask, no next step):

Subject: Question

Hi Sarah,

Hope you're doing well! As you know, we've been working on the vendor evaluation for the past few weeks. The team looked at five options and narrowed it down to two. There were a lot of considerations around pricing, support SLAs, and integration effort, and honestly it was a close call. After several discussions we're leaning toward Acme, though DataCo has some advantages too. Anyway, I was wondering if you might have some time to maybe look this over when you get a chance?

Thanks!

✅ House-style version:

Subject: Approval needed by Thu: Acme as our data vendor ($36k/yr)

Hi Sarah,

Can you approve Acme as our data vendor by Thursday 5pm? Their quote expires Friday.

Why Acme over DataCo:

• 20% cheaper at our volume ($36k vs $45k/yr)
• 24h support SLA vs business-hours only
• Integration estimated at 2 days vs 2 weeks

Full comparison attached. Next step: on your approval I'll sign Thursday and kick off integration Monday.

Best, Simon

# Complete worked example: bad-news email

❌ Bad version (buried, vague, blame-shifting):

Subject: Project update

Hi all, lots of moving parts lately! The team has been heads-down and we've made real progress on several fronts. That said, given some dependencies outside our control and a few unexpected challenges, the timeline may need to be revisited somewhat...

✅ House-style version:

Subject: Launch slips 2 weeks to Oct 3 — mitigation below

Hi all,

The launch moves from Sept 19 to Oct 3. Cause: the payment-provider API migration returned breaking changes we discovered in integration testing on Tuesday.

Mitigation:

• Beta customers keep the Sept 19 date on the legacy flow
• Marketing holds the announcement until Sept 26

Next step: I'll confirm the new date is solid at Friday's checkpoint and report here by 3pm.

# Follow-up sequence without passive aggression

• Follow-up 1 (day 3): "Resending — I need your sign-off by Wed to keep the Friday ship date."
• Follow-up 2 (day 5): "Deadline risk: without sign-off today, ship moves to next sprint. Reply 'go' and I'll handle the rest."
• Escalation (day 6, new thread, manager CC'd): facts and dates only: "Sign-off requested Aug 1, followed up Aug 4 and Aug 6; ship date at risk."

# Gotchas

• "Hope you're well" openers — harmless once, filler when the ask is urgent. If the email fits on one screen with it, keep it; otherwise cut.
• Bold more than one thing and nothing is bold. One bolded element per email.
• Questions hidden in statements ("It would be great to know the budget") get no answers. Ask directly with a question mark.
• CC as pressure reads as hostile. CC managers only with a stated reason ("CC Dana for visibility on the date change").
• Attachment amnesia — name the attachment in the body ("comparison attached") so its absence is caught before sending.