“I am not suggesting that you stop using email,” I continued. “I am suggesting that you use it like a tool.”
“But there are so many emails, every day,” Diane resisted.
“How many of those are junk, that don’t even need to be opened?” I asked.
“Well, there are some, but most get trapped in our spam filter.”
“And, of what’s left, how many need an immediate 1-2 sentence response?”
Diane was thinking, “About 10 percent.”
“And what do you do with those?”
“I leave them in my INBOX so I don’t forget them, until I can get around to replying.”
“And what about the ones that need a decision, where you have to think about the alternatives. What happens to those emails?”
“Those are important, so I keep those in my INBOX,” Diane replied.
“And what about those emails that are informational, don’t need a response, but you need the information for some reason, like an update on a project? Where do you keep those?”
“Well, if it’s an active project that I am working on, I will likely leave it in my INBOX so I can get to it quickly, in case someone asks me about the project.”
“Diane, do you see a pattern, here?”
I don’t think we have a choice in the mater; we have to embrace technology and leverage it in every way possible. We must respond fast and not leave emails waiting for hours because were a bit overwhelmed. The world has already embraced emails and text messages as an instant form of communication. Fortunately, most emails can be responded to in less than 1 minuet. Hence the popularity of the dreaded Crackberry…
As far as my (outlook) desktop is concerned, I became overwhelmed with how I file messages, search for messages, attachments and where to file messages… at one point I had well over 100 folders filled with stuff. (Sorry IT Guys)…
Somewhere in my overwhelmed state, I read a book about in-box management and took the plunge to create only 3 folders… ((Follow-Up, Archive and Hold)). Follow-Up is where all my “Live†to-do items reside. Archive is my 1 giant bucket for all old information and messages (no sub-folders allowed). And the Hold folder is anything I’m waiting on an answer for. It has simplified my life tremendously. I did break the rules a bit… I also kept a few key folders for very specific things; such as Monday Reports and Personal Items.
Good Luck!
I’ve been reading and listening lately (not just on this site) to lots of ideas as to how to manage our emails for better efficiency and basically they all involve creating a good folder system.
The most effective solution I’ve found however has been simply to DELETE, immediately after reading, many more emails than I would have been comfortable doing in the past.
Saving emails “just in case” can become a compulsive urge that we have to force ourselves to overcome.
Also, if emails are addressed to recipients in the right way then deciding which ones you really need to keep can be much easier. For instance…primary recipient in the TO: box, secondary recipients, in order of importance, in the CC: box. The further down your name is on the list, the less likey that you have to worry about it.
Most email programs include the ability to ARCHIVE an email as opposed to DELETE. This will allow a search if, later, you need the information on the email. MS-Outlook has a pitiful seach protocol making it almost useless. Gmail uses Google-search algorithms that are lightning fast. I haven’t deleted an email for 5 years. They sit in an archive, incredibly retrievable. This means I am much more liberal in hitting the ARCHIVE button. I always know I can find it later, in a flash.