There are times (not infrequently) where I receive an e-mail which requires a group response (“Reply All”), as well as, a note/comment to one or another recipient – and I don’t necessarily want to share that response with the entire group. For instance, if a client makes a request of me while cc-ing the entire project team, I may respond to ‘all’ with ‘sure, no problem’, while also wanting to direct a more specific response to my development team (e.g. ‘please make sure to include this change before we deliver the next phase of the project’).
What I’ve done in the past is to hit ‘Reply to All’ with the ‘sure, no problem’, then try to remember to go back to the message and hit ‘Forward’ and send the e-mail to only one or two people with a more specific response. While it doesn’t sound like a big deal to do that, I have had occasions where the phone rang, or I got similarly interrupted or distracted, and forgot to send the follow-up e-mail. Or, by the time I compose the first, then go back in to compose the second, I’ve forgotten the ‘perfect’ wording that I had a minute ago. Both situations have happened to me more frequently than I’d care to admit.
WELL…I just found a nifty FREE add-on that works with Outlook, Gmail, Blackberry or Twitter. A wonderful little company called ‘bccthis’ (http://www.bccthis.com/) gives you the ability to compose the ‘aside’ at the same time you are composing the ‘public’ response. It inserts the additional text right in the body of the e-mail. You don’t have to remember to ‘send it later’. The person/people you used the ‘bccthis’ tool on will receive TWO e-mails – the first is the same that everyone receives. The second includes the bccthis message with the subject line annotated with ‘BCCTHIS’, so the recipient knows it is different.
bccthis remains open in Outlook (I only tested the Outlook version) all the time, but you can minimize the application, so that it’s not intrusive all the time – you just have to expand it when you need it. So far, I’m liking it!
