Email Delegation

I sent out an email to some managers of the branches (23 of them) asking for their input on a publication I was going to be distributing later. I was stuck on a final quantity to print and since they would know more about their branches distribution patterns, I asked them if they would need less than or more than 200 copies for each branch.

If they were fine with the requisite 200, then don't bother responding and I will be sure to have 200 sent to their branch. I get a few emails back and out of the five that responded, three said that 200 was fine with them, of course. Some people don't read their email and pay particular attention to all the details. I expect that.

However, I got one back that really blew my mind; The Manager forwarded it to an associate and said that 200 was fine and added who to send it to, my boss. Not me, the originator of the email, but my boss. My boss ended up forwarding it to me, so that I could see that, yes, ignore the email since they were requesting the default 200 quantity.

What blows my mind is that the entire string of emails was unneccessary if the Manager had just read the email. Heck, she could have kept two other people out of the loop if she had just hit reply instead of forward. But I guess she felt she had to delegate this to someone. She must have been too busy reading her emails so thoroughly.