Acknowledging Without Answering: Simple Techniques for Deferred Responses

When working on large initiatives or managing multiple clients as a consultant, you likely get messages late in the day that deserve more than a quick response. Use these easy techniques to let the sender know you're aware of it.

Let's start with email, as this is the easiest one to adopt yourself (i.e. it doesn't require a cultural shift with others).

"I'll reply more meaningfully tomorrow."

This sets clear expectations and signals thoughtfulness, plus it's professional to use with internal and external stakeholders.

Other options within email are something like "got it" or using the newly minted email reactions that are baked into Google Workspace and Microsoft 365.

The former doesn't set an expectation and may seem off-putting for those that have not seen it before, and the latter does not work well across organizations.

Moving to chats in Slack or Teams (and even text messages), a simple emoji reaction goes a long way.

👀

It's simple and indicates that you saw the message. Other variations of this are a thinking face (🤔) or clock (⏰).

Unlike the email response that explicitly sets an expectation on when a reply will be sent, that technique requires having a common understanding or "norm" within your team.

Talk with your team to decide which emoji you'll adopt and what the expectation is that goes along with it.

TLDR: Acknowledge messages quickly with these simple responses in email, Slack, Teams, or texts, setting expectations without a full reply.