#288: TMI (Friday, July 6)

“...we can get caught up with the idea that we must embellish our conversations with lots of personal details... What we often fail to consider is how these thoughts are received by another person." - Jay Remer, the Etiquette Guy

In the last few weeks, I've been a few situations where people share too much information (TMI). There is a fine line between being an honest, open communicator and TMI. A very fine line. Unfortunately electronic communications and social media only make it worse, since you are unable to gauge the other party's response to your TMI.

It may not be intuitive, but sharing TMI is also poor etiquette. Etiquette is about being thoughtful and considerate; TMI can make another person feel uncomfortable, embarrassed and can often change the general mood.

So what constitutes TMI? It depends on the situation and the context. What might be TMI in one situation, could be perfectly normal in another. Generally speaking, I think it depends on three factors:

• Who's around. An embarrassing story shared with your close friends may not be TMI, but add a few strangers (or a couple work colleagues) and it changes the story altogether.
• Where you are. A story shared on Facebook/Twitter is different from one shared in a close setting. With social media, the important "backstory" can sometimes get lost, or it can be subject to misinterpretation.
• The relevance. This one's a little tricky, because your anecdote could be relevant and still be TMI, but it may be received a bit better if it's on topic rather than TMI that has nothing to do with what's being discussed. 

So before you share something in a mixed crowd, ask yourself these questions: 1) Would I be embarrassed if this story were repeated to someone I don't know, or to my boss? 2) Why am I sharing this information? 3) Could this be misinterpreted?

Think before you speak/type.