Email Templates for HR

How do I write the perfect HR email?

The role of HR is an important one in any business. Happier and more comfortable employees are more likely to put more effort into their work, and that means more productivity and efficiency.

Since email is your most valuable tool of communication in HR, it’s important you know how to write good email copy to really reach your colleagues. Here’s how you can do that:

• Be warm and friendly. In a HR role, it’s essential that your colleagues feel like they can come to you with any problem in the workplace. To do that, they need to feel like they’re talking to a real person. You can set this environment by being friendly and human in all of your emails – write like you talk in real life, feel free to be a bit more natural and less corporate. This will break down the formal barrier between you and employees.

• Use bold formatting to highlight key points Another part of a HR professional’s job is to communicate crucial information to employees. Many of your emails will content that crucial information and so you need to be really clear with bringing it out. One shortcut to doing this is to put important dates, contact details, and locations in bold. The bold formatting naturally draws our attention, making it easy to locate and remember.

• Keep it short and to the point Your colleagues are busy people, just like you. They don’t have the time to read paragraphs of texts to find out what it is you need to communicate. Because of that, it’s best to keep things short, sweet and simple so they can find what they need to know quickly and easily. Use bullet points to convey the big messages, and always have a proofread to check whether anything can be cut.

What emails should I send to a new hire?

Starting your first day or week in a new job can be an intense experience – but thankfully, HR can make this initial period much easier to cope with.

One way to do this is to provide key information in emails before the new hire has even arrived. These should include things like:

• The welcome email, welcoming the new hire to their team and providing an introduction.
• The induction email, providing the need-to-knows about the business such as HR processes and safety information.
• The IT email, showing the new hire what they need to do to get their IT equipment properly set up.
• The announcement email, introducing the new hire to the entire business.

How can I maximize open rates for HR emails?

Just like anyone sending emails, you’ll want your colleagues to open your emails and especially if those emails have important info about the workplace or about the employer.

The problem is, all too often employees are very busy focusing on their day-to-day work and that can mean HR emails fall to the wayside.

This is only natural, but when you have something highly important to send, the best way to ensure open rates is to add an “IMPORTANT” at the start of the subject line. This won’t work if you do it all the time of course, but once in a while, it works well to get everyone’s attention.