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Email Etiquette – When should you use BCC and CC?

Do you work in a business where you spend more time sorting through your email Inbox then on productive work? Well if you are being CC’d into everything unnecessarily then it is time to make a change!

Today I’m talking about what To, CC and BCC actually mean and best practice when using them.

In our business we recently started using a new software provider and I’m responsible for the client work on this platform. We had two weeks of teething issues when completing our first project and I originally started CC’ing my business partner Tom in on the emails I was sending to the tech support team to ‘keep him in the loop,’ but in fact I was going against everything I tell our clients. All I was doing was distracting him and myself unnecessarily.

I check my emails 2-3 times a day and only at specific times whereas he leaves his open so every time the tech support team would respond, he would read it and then ask me “Dannielle did you see their response?” or ask “what was the issue?”. This was distracting both of us, we have daily chats so the topic could have just been brought up then without taking us away from our scheduled tasks.

So…. firstly, what is To, CC and BCC anyway?

To: Add contacts with whom you are directly communicating with. There is nothing wrong with a list of emails Note: In the ‘To’ receipt field; everyone who receives the email can see the other email addresses the email has been sent to
CC (Carbon Copy): Add contacts who you want to know about the email but are not required to action or respond to it Note: In the CC receipt field; everyone who receives the email can see the other email addresses as well
BCC (Blind Carbon Copy): Contacts added in the BCC section will not be seen by other recipients

Ok, so let’s break it down:

The To Field:

Add email addresses in the ‘To’ field for people you are specifically addressing. When people see that an email is directly sent to them they will be under the impression they need to respond or complete an action.

Avoid adding more people to the ‘To’ line then necessary as they will think they need to action something in the email and may create confusion

The CC (Carbon Copy) field

People often think by ‘CC’ing’ a colleague that they are ‘keeping them in the loop,’ but this isn’t always the best way to keep people informed. Firstly this means the receipt has to read through the message to figure out why they received it and this could include going through a whole conversation of messages, which ultimately wastes time and may just create more questions anyway. A better idea may be to bring it up with them at a daily/weekly meeting or sending them a direct email saying, “Bill, can you please read this section of the report” or simply copying and pasting the information they need to read and sending it to them directly.

Also, by ‘CC’ing’ your colleagues into many emails they may begin to stop seeing your emails as important and may place them directly into a ‘reference’ folder or ‘read later folder.’ This may lead to important information being missed in the future.

Carbon Copy or more commonly known in today's world is courtesy copy.

The use of CC is used for all the wrong reasons these days; here are some quick Do’s and Don’ts:

Do:

Use CC when a department, members of a team or a manager need current information about the continual progress of a particular project, event Etc.
When interested parties such as management or team members specifically ask to be kept informed of certain projects or events
CC someone in when you are sending a message to someone else but you’re allowing the people in the CC line to be kept in the loop and you are letting the person you emailed it to; known who else is up to speed
Use CC if you are doing a job on behalf of someone else so they can see the progress of the job

But please don’t:

Don’t CC people in to cover your arse, by CC’ing people in so if something goes wrong you can say “but you saw my email.” This isn’t appropriate or cool
Don’t CC people in to embarrass someone. We hear all too often about someone in a team will make a harmless mistake and when another colleague picks it up, emails them and CCs their managers and fellow workers in to passively embarrass them. No this is also not cool
Don’t CC your boss in to prove they were wrong on a comment or suggestion they made
Don’t CC people in to remove your responsibilities. For example, you’re working with another co-worker and you’ve completed your part so you email the other person and CC people from the department and management to let them know they haven’t completed their section
Don’t CC someone in if you are expecting them to respond to the email. They need to be addressed to in the To field

The BCC (Blind Carbon Copy) Field

‘Blind carbon copy’ is a way of sending emails to multiple people without them knowing who else is receiving the email. Any emails in the BCC field will be invisible to everyone else in the To and CC fields.

BCC should only be used when it isn’t a personal email and you want to keep the receipts email private. For example:

Informing suppliers/clients of change of address or phone number
Sending out a weekly newsletter to clients who do not know each other, you may wish to respectfully keep their addresses private

I highly recommended not using BCC at work. It is deceitful to lead someone to believe they are the only one receiving an email when they actually aren’t. The CC field does them same thing in a message as the BCC; the CC’d person is on the email but isn’t expected to respond – but it is done in an open honest way. If you need to copy your boss on an email, copy your boss, but don't pretend they aren't copied in.

Also, remember that if the person you BCC’d presses the ‘reply all’ button, everyone else will know that you secretly added them to the email chain.

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More Awesome Articles:

Why leading with vision is the worst piece of advice for new leaders
How to correctly ask an employee to do a task
How to lead a conversation by pausing

If you would like to learn more about email etiquette in the workplace, call Dannielle on 0437 653 328 or email [email protected].

Like Like Celebrate Support Love Insightful Funny Comment Share 23 Comments Marco Patelli, graphic

Marco Patelli 2y

interesting article. But please allow me to add and disagree on the use of CC and BCC in the professional organisations. Imagine that HR needs to inform different departments regarding the need to update a confidential information. If using TO or CC to reach all involved individuals at once, the default reply will be REPLY ALL, and everyone would access sensitive private information. if using BCC instead, then each of those individuals would have as default REPLY TO, and the confidential data would be accessible only by the email originator. Even for announcing corporate events, with RSVP. Imagine a 12000 employees corporation where everyone would receive a confirmation email for the event. The data traffic would be huge if CC or TO fields were used for such email, instead of BCC. I would respectfully suggest that BCC field is highly recommended for informative messages, as you can't control the receiver's responses, and avoid it to become a spam wave. What do you think about this perspective.?.

Like Reply 1 Reaction Syrinity Holbrook, graphic

Syrinity Holbrook 2y

continued--- forgot to mention that i work from home and dont live in the same state as these people, so there is no way to talk in person at an actual job/business location. All our communicating has always been done over email and maybe a phone call on very rare occassions. Just FYI. Thanks again. ps) I can see on my post that my job title is showing publicly, i didnt know it would. However thankfully im an open book at this point so im ok with it but plz PLZ if ur someone lookin to just talk sh*t on a single mother for doin what she has to to provide for her kids plz THINK TWICE cuz i will make u feel like a fool, trust me, so if u dont have advice on my question & just like bein a troll, plz just keep scrolling cuz this is one fight not worth starting plz, thank u

Like Reply 1 Reaction Syrinity Holbrook, graphic

Syrinity Holbrook 2y

Thanks for clearing this up, very helpful. But I do have another question for ya.. I totally agree with not using the CC to embarrass someone at work, not the way I would handle THAT situation. BUT im in a similar situation but with differences I feel may call for it, but i wanted opinions first.. What if someone at work has lied, manipulated (and definitly broken the companies terms & agreements), preformed actions in (possibley an illegal) way to trick others into a contract with THEIR own company, so that they can keep a percentage of that persons earnings without them even knowing it happened! Then person finds out & wants to tell the original company.. to see if the contract is even valid! I felt a group email with just us 3 ppl might be the only way to assure them what im saying is accurate (otherwise i wouldnt say it right in front of/or include that person in the email too).. AND a group msg might be the only way to make the manipulator admit to it all rather than go on lying (now knowing he's not just talkin to me alone anymore). Hoping it would just minimize further deceit, sh*t-talking, & hoping it would keep things more honest, transparent.. force the person to do the right thing. Right to the point, no BS. opinions?

Like Reply 1 Reaction Patrick J Mims, graphic

Patrick J Mims 2y

Email? What's that? You want something? Slack me, submit a ticket, or best yet, take me to lunch.

Like Reply 1 Reaction Rene O'Neil, graphic

Email Etiquette – When Should You Use BCC And CC? - LinkedIn

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Welcome back

More articles by Dannielle Walz

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