From ASAPP to ASAP: Is Business Correspondence Becoming Less Polite?
Just a short note today from the archives of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum. While researching this week, I’ve been reading hundreds of pages of inter-office memos, letters, press releases, and shipping orders from record executives. Many of the shipping orders were sent out as promotion to key people in the recording industry, and the ones I was looking at were from the desk of Mo Ostin, President of Warner Bros. Records.
On these shipping orders, in the comment box, I saw a note: “ASAPP.” At first I thought it was a typo, but then after seeing it on multiple other sheets, it hit me: the extra “P” is for “please.” It seems like a small but important letter. Even when rushing, and there's a lot of money on the line, it pays to be kind.
Where did that last “P” go in today's business acronymicon?