Do you seek clarification via the Teams/telephone first?

Sometimes you get a cryptic email and think... "what on earth!?" In those cases, a quick call (on Teams or a phone) can solve most of your troubles.

We've all received a cryptic email at some point. Simply replying "I don't understand" is not productive. Call the person who sent the email instead. Chances are if the sender of the task couldn't explain the task well enough the first time, it's likely a voice conversation is needed to clarify the issue.

Having clarified the issue by phone, update the task by replying to the original email with the new details arising from the conversation. Remember to start with "As per our conversation".

However, sometimes you cannot immediately reach the task owner. In this case, you should try to contact the person a few more times. If you are still not able to contact them, you should reply to the email and state it in the first line:

What if you need to send a complex email?

If you ever sent an email and got a response saying it's too cryptic it is because you didn't include enough details. That's why it's important to always add context and reasoning to emails.