Mailing lists

The Division manages a number of mailing lists (including Heads of Department mailing list, Departmental Administrators, all major committees and the Board) through Sympa, the University’s centrally managed mailing list system. For a complete list of mailing lists, including information about list owners and moderators, please contact Head of Communications Alison Brindle (alison.brindle@medsci.ox.ac.uk).

Staff are able to send messages to these mailing lists, but please note: 

• All posts to academic, administrative leads, committees and the Board will be moderated (e.g. they will be approved by the relevant moderators before they are sent to the mailing list)
• Only messages of direct relevance to academic and administrative leads should be sent to their respective mailing lists (no ‘please cascade’ type message)
• Please refer to the email guidance below before posting to a mailing list (in particular to academic and administrators mailing lists)
• There are many different communication channels available in the Divisional Office which may be appropriate for the announcement you wish to send out. For further information about the aims of each of these channels and how best to use them, please see Medical Sciences Divisional Communication Channels. If you are unsure which channel is best for your particular communications, please email communications@medsci.ox.ac.uk

Best practice email guidance

• Add a descriptive title or brief summary in Subject field
• Identify if “Action Required” or “For information only” in Subject field
• At the beginning of your email (especially if it’s long), provide a 2 line (max) summary of the email’s content
• If an action is required of the recipient, add this to the beginning of the email too (e.g. Please respond by x) and if the email is going to multiple parties make it clear who should action it
• Don’t assume people will open attachments. If you can put the content of your attachment in the email body, then do so.  Better still, don’t send attachments to mailing lists (use SharePoint or similar)
• Think about whom you are sending the email to. Ask yourself, does everybody need to receive this email?
• Always include a signature, with your phone number (Signature Template) 
• Keep messages short
• Don’t use acronyms (unless you are certain all your recipients understand them, or provide a glossary of terms) 
• If you are out of the office for more than one day, set up your automatic out of office on email. Add a contact in case of emergency (and make sure that person is around to answer emails). Also, update your voicemail to state that you are out of the office.

Resources

Please also see UAS email protocols