If you think a person has been irresponsible with his work (changing responses
to inquiries without reason and not really researching for the answer) and you
sent a message with the ending sentence 「もう少し誠実に対応頂けませんか。」can you consider
this word as too harsh or rude or unprofessional?

Does 「もう少し誠実に対応頂けませんか。」mean, 「Can you be more serious with your work.」?
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2019-05-14T01:47:35.387
68207
2019-05-14T18:18:26.500
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question
meaning expressions phrases
Is the sentence 「もう少し誠実に対応頂けませんか。」rude and unprofessional? What does it literally mean in English?
Meaning-wise and grammar-wise, this sentence is perfect. Indeed it is harsh,
but it may be rightly so; there are situations you may need to write an email
like this one. Anyone who has received it will notice his/her overall work
attitude is severely doubted.
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2019-05-14T14:26:27.030
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2019-05-14T14:26:27.030
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Doesn't the question of whether this sentence would be "too harsh or rude or
unprofessional" depend largely on your relationship with the other person?
What is appropriately harsh in an email to a subordinate who has already been
warned about his or her poor performance might be completely out of bounds if
you're addressing a colleague of equal rank – let alone a client or your boss.
Since you've only identified the target of this sentence as "a person," it's
very hard to answer your question as asked.

As for how one might translate the sentence, I'd say this is one of those
cases where it's difficult to come up with something that is both close to the
meaning of the original and also idiomatic in English. 誠実 is particularly
problematic, because it involves not just "seriousness," but also sincerity
and even honesty. In this case, at least, I think something along the lines of
"Can you please conduct yourself with a bit more integrity?" might be more in
the spirit of the original than your "Can you be more serious with your work?"
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2019-05-14T18:18:26.500
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2019-05-14T18:18:26.500
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answer