Email

Owned by Daniel Puratich
Last updated: 2024-09-02
4 min read

Introduction

This policy explains how WARG uses it’s email account(s) and how WARG members () should interact and email for WARG purposes.

Usage

Members are welcome to email for WARG purposes in some cases from their personal University of Waterloo email addresses, however, the WARG email must at least be CCed in all WARG related correspondences for purposes. If this is accidentally forgotten, do not worry, just forward the email chain or CC in the WARG email as soon as possible.

WARG leads should the official WARG email account for all their WARG related correspondences as explained below.

Questions

If you have any questions regarding the contents of this document, please ping the Operations lead in #ops-administration.

Email Account

Current Address

Our current address is given by the following embed:

All incoming emails regarding WARG should be sent to this address. All critical and leadership relevant emails should be sent from this email box. Personal emails can be used to send emails relevant to WARG in accordance with the below policies.

Everyone in WARG leadership is responsible for keeping up to date with emails that arrive in our current email address.

Filtering

This inbox may be filtered by communication type using the “+” sign modifier. For example, all EFS bootcamp records get submitted uwarg+efsbootcamp@uwaterloo.ca. Additional addresses may be added as required to further filter the email inbox.

Past Addresses

We have historically (prior to May 2023) managed a number of email accounts, including but not limited to:

This list is exhaustive and strains our communication with university officials, prospective members, and sponsors. It is also difficult for the Operations team to effectively monitor so many inboxes. For this reason, we are moving towards phasing out all emails accounts in favor of the above current address.

Usage of Past Addresses

In certain cases, a Gmail account may be required (e.g. sending and receiving Google Calendar invitations). For these purposes, please only use uw.warg@gmail.com. The Operations team will not be monitoring addresses other than uwarg@uwaterloo.ca and uw.warg@gmail.com closely.

Email Access

Access to WARG email accounts is restricted to team directors, advisors, sub-team leads, and select project managers. If you are a team member and need to access the WARG email address, please contact your respective sub-team lead. If you are a project manager and would like to request access, please ping your sub-team lead and the current Operations lead in #ops-administration.

Password Scrambling

The uwarg@uwaterloo.ca and uw.warg@gmail.com should be scrambled by directors along with the bay code at the start of every term.

Email Standards

Professional Conduct

The WARG email address is our primary mode of communication with the University of Waterloo, external suppliers, and our sponsors. As such, messages must be sent with the utmost professionalism and respect. Using the WARG email address for personal matters is not permitted.

Leaving Unread Messages

If you open a message in the WARG inbox that was not intended for you, please close the message and mark it as unread. This will help the intended recipient find the message and reply as required.

Categories

Please use the categories for emails including drafts, send emails, threads, and received emails. This improves searchability in the future as we can filter by category to find related emails. A lot of the emails we send get repetitive so copy pasta is very nice and categories are an easy way to do this.

Signatures

See below sections to set this up but ending emails with our nice email signature is nice.

Two-Factor Authentication

Two-factor authentication (2FA) is required for leads to access the team’s Outlook and OneDrive.

To add your device to 2FA: https://uwaterloo.login.duosecurity.com/devices

See also: .

Email Signatures

WARG’s standard signature should be used when sending, replying and forwarding messages from uwarg@uwaterloo.ca. To use the standard signature, you can either modify the default signature template or create your own custom signature.

You have to add in the signature manually and it will be visible in your draft.

Modifying the Default Signature

When you select “New mail” in Outlook (web version) the default signature is set to append to the end of the message. If the signature does not appear on its own, select Insert > Signatures > WARG TEMPLATE. The default signature is formatted to contain the senders first and last name, followed by their position, and the WARG wordmark. Please populate the “First Last” and “Position” fields with your name and your position, respectfully. See the modified email signature bellow.

Default Signature
Modified Signature

Using a Custom Signature

If you use the Outlook account to send and receive messages frequently, a custom email signature may have been added for you. To verify, create a new message the select the “Signatures” dropdown in the “Insert” tab. If your name is listed in the dropdown menu, a custom email signature has already been created for you. This signature should be used every time you send a message.

Creating a Custom Signature

If you do not have a custom signature and would like to create one, please follow these steps:

  1. In the “Insert” tab, select the “Signatures” dropdown and “Signatures...” at the bottom of the list. This will open a settings window so you can modify the existing signatures.

  2. In the primary dropdown, select WARG TEMPLATE and copy the contents of the default signature.

  3. Select the “New Signature” button, and paste the contents of the default signature in the formatting box.

  4. Populate the “First Last” and “Position” fields with your name and your position, respectfully.

  5. In the “Edit signature name” field enter your full name (first and last).

  6. Click “Save”

You have now created your custom email signature!