As I’ve written in previous posts, I’ve been on a mission to get a handle on my use of email. I’ve made many efficiency changes to both the tools and processes I use. I don’t see this process as something that has a definite end point, it is more of a on-going wider goal to deal with the constant flood of information that we’re all dealing with.
My boss has taken an interested in what I was doing (our business is quite email heavy) and asked me to write up some notes on dealing with email to help my colleagues. I drew on my own experience, tips and tricks I’ve picked up from things like 4Hour work week, email charter and more recently inbox zero.
Here is the full article that I put together:
Winning the email battle
Many people have a love-hate relationship with email. It is a necessary tool to communicate, but can often consume vast amounts of time. Below are some tips/thoughts on making your use of email more efficient.
Search, don’t file
- Don’t have too many folders. Inbox, saved (or archive, the name isn’t important) and trash is probably enough
- Modern search tools are very efficient and you’ll save all that time it would have taken you to create/ file and never find anything ever again
Batch
- Constantly gazing at your inbox is soul destroying
- Use a batch method – for example: check email for 10 mins, do a task for 20 mins, check email for 10 mins, do task for 20 mins, and so on. See what fits for you
- Turn off email pop ups/sounds
- Ideas for what to do when you batch:
- file actioned emails to your one “archive” folder
- setup calendar appointments or to-do lists with actions, then file
Versions of documents via email doesn’t scale
- Emailing around updated versions of documents is painful, use another appropriate collaboration tool such as network file share or Google Docs
Think of other people’s time, not just your own
- Do you really NEED to CC someone?
- Do you need to say thanks? (remember it takes the other person time to open/delete)
- Are you providing enough information in the email? Will the recipient need to come back for more info or open other resources?
- Are you providing too much information? Could it be said in just a few sentences? Get to the point!! (http://three.sentenc.es)
Maintain a comfortable inbox size
- People have different ways of maintaining their inbox: some people prefer to get to zero, some people use it as a task tracking list with just items they need to action, some people don’t file anything. The first two options are preferable. Some things to think about:
- An email cull for items over a certain age is a good idea. 1 month is a good starting point. Move to your archive folder.
- Using the rules in this guide should have a positive impact on your inbox size and the work required to maintain it. Encourage other people to do the same.
Other useful resources on email usage:
- http://emailcharter.org/
- http://email.about.com/od/netiquettetips/qt/et_good_subject.htm
- http://inboxzero.com/
In addition to the car I got:
Secondly you need to know how to program the charger with correct details for your battery.
So with this I went out and had one of those crashes you see in formula one races. The car hits the barrier, suspension bends, wheels are dragging along side the car, the only thing I didn’t see was the sparks flying.
After recovering bits of car and going back to the pits (aka the spare room) it turns out that two parts of broke. There is a small plate that connects the front lower suspension arms together and a hub carrier (the thing that holds the wheel to the suspension).
Unfortunately this spare part is on back order, so I’ve temporarily used a couple of cable ties to hopefully, along side the super glue, give it some strength.
I think this will always be work in progress! Here is a 
