These days, we use our phones all the time for texting and messaging. You may even message your supervisors, coworkers and customers sometimes. You probably use texting language to do this.

While texting language is fine for messaging your friends and family, you should avoid using it in business. This is because texting language does not use standard English spelling and vocabulary, and it often uses abbreviations (short forms) of words and phrases.

For example, you might text something like this:

Pls means “please,” B means “be,” B4 means “before” and TY means “thank you.” Not everyone will understand this message. Even if your reader understands all the informal language and abbreviations, this message seems like you were being lazy or did not care about being mature and professional.

In business, always use standard English spelling and vocabulary that everyone can understand. Therefore, this message should be written as follows: