Dear hypothetical reader: this is a coalescence of some thoughts that have been circulating through my head over the past several years. Hopefully if I write them down, I can make room for other, more interesting thoughts.

I’m opposed to the idea that an organization (I apply this equally to civic organizations, club, and businesses) might use email addresses which the people doing the organization’s business set up with their personal email provider of choice.

That is to say, the organization’s leadership shouldn’t send email to the general public (or even the organization’s own members) from @yahoo.com, @gmail.com, or @whatever email address that isn’t owned by the organization. (Ideally, this would be the same domain name as the organization’s web site, but I do recognize that for some small businesses, their primary web presence is Etsy or something similar.)

I have three main reasons for this

• It doesn’t look professional. People expect to get email from the organization they’re transacting with. (Would you do business with Amazon if the emails came from JeffyB64@yahoo.com?)
• Having mail boxes the organization administers provides a fallback if someone forgets their password. (This was recently driven home for me when a friend lost access to 20+ years of business correspondence because of a lost AOL password.)
• Having email addresses the organization administers protects both the organization and the individual if someone leaves under less than amicable circumstances. (Someone leaving under such circumstances is unlikely to be happy if asked to forward emails indefinitely.)

(Image via Pixabay user Deans_icons used under Pixabay License.)