Prompts · Writing & memos

Rewrite an email I shouldn't send angry

Keep every point. Lose the heat. Find out which line would have cost you.

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Here's an email I've written and haven't sent:

This is the third time I've asked for the figures. I can't build the deck without them and I'm the one who looks unprepared on Thursday while your team apparently has better things to do. I need them today.

Who it's going to: a peer in another team I'll have to work with all year
What I actually want to happen: the figures by Wednesday morning, and for this not to happen again next quarter

Rewrite it so I get that outcome. Keep every point I'm making. Drop the temperature.

Then tell me two things:
- The line in my original that would have cost me the most, and what the reader would have heard in it.
- The thing I'm asking for that I never actually asked for clearly. Angry emails bury the request.

Don't make it warmer than it needs to be. I'm not apologising and I don't want to sound grateful. Firm, short, and hard to argue with. Under 150 words.

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What you get: A version you can send, plus the sentence in your draft that would have done the damage.

The rewrite isn't the hard part

Any model will smooth your tone. The line doing the real work is the one about the buried request. Angry emails describe what went wrong at length and then never say plainly what you want the other person to do, so they reply defending themselves and nothing moves.

The other instruction worth keeping is "don't make it warmer than it needs to be". Left alone, models turn a fair complaint into an apology for complaining.

Try one of these next

Chase money someone owes me

The message to send today, and what to do when they ignore it.

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Cut this in half without losing the point

Shorter, and a list of everything that went, so you can put back what mattered.

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Say no without wrecking the relationship

A decline that's kind, short, and doesn't leave the door half open.

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