Inbox Zero

Inbox Zero is a concept that boils down nicely, email is taking up too much time. Most of us have a workload that exceeds our resources, you won’t be able to fix that problem but you can choose what takes up your time. My standard operating procedure for email was to check it when I logged into work, deal with some of the easy stuff, put most of it off, and eventually ignore most of it. For quite a while now I’ve been following most of the Inbox Zero tenets, for personal email it has never been too bad. Work email is another beast though and developing a process to deal with it has helped my mental sanity and productivity quite a bit. Also I get to brag on twitter about having nothing sitting in my inbox.

So first a few links to start out:

The index of Inbox Zero at 43 Folders, they have quite a few articles about the concept and how to implement it. In particular I like the Philosophy and Better Practices articles.

Less Email

Unsubscribe to Mail

Look at the bulk email you are receiving, if you don’t read it consistently, unsubscribe. I know you’re thinking ‘but it may be important’. Stop. If you don’t read it, unsubscribe. Now.

Look for alternate means of consumption

If you do read it, or really need to be aware of the content take a moment to evaluate. Does it need to come through your inbox? Can you consume through RSS or another mechanism like google groups?

Digests

Can you move any subscriptions from ‘per message’ to daily or weekly digests? If so it’s easier to set aside time to work through the emails and keep current on a topic. It also just takes up less space. I will say that I hate most digest formats though.

Filter

Things you do need to be aware of or mailing lists you do read consistently can be dealt with without hitting your inbox. This is done through mail rules that will bypass your inbox and put your mail somewhere you can batch process it as appropriate. The goal is to kill constant interruptions and make your inbox a place to work and communicate from, not a time sink.

Mail from People

When you scroll through your inbox, sort by sender, and look for people who are just slamming you with email.

FYI, WFH, WTFBBQ emails

If the sender is informing you of status that doesn’t affect your day to day operations ask them not to copy you on the message. If this is not possible or they are unwilling then it is time to set up filters for likely subject or body lines and squirrel them away in a folder that won’t hit your eyes unless you want them to.

Project or Account info

If you keep getting messages from the same project manager or group of people working on the same topic check and see if you really need to be getting all these notes. This is not to advocate checking out of projects you are involved in, but to evaluate the appropriateness of email as a project management tool. Sometimes email is the correct mechanism but often there is another appropriate repository for this type of communication and you should utilize it.

If this isn’t an option asking (nicely) to digest email communications to once or twice a day longer emails may be effective.

SPAM

Good Luck?

Keep less Mail

Archive or Delete

If you don’t need it get rid of it. If you may need it archive it. Don’t let it sit around keeping up space and mindshare. Again, especially with work mail I find that archiving is the way to go, my disk space is cheap and I’m happy to have a large mail file if I have things I need. That being said I do my best to move information OUT of my inbox. This means placing shared content on wikis, generally interesting information onto blogs, and project specific information in project management tools and wikis.

Schedule Email Time

For me email is a 3 times a day activity, when I start my workday, sometime shortly before my lunch break and before I head out for the day. If you need to schedule time for it on your calendar, for me it’s an informal approach. Otherwise I try not to look at my email. This means, that when I do look at my inbox a few rules apply.

First Rule

If you have time to look at it you must have time to answer it. If it takes less than 5 minutes to respond, just do it then. It may suck but waiting won’t make it suck less. If it’s a task that takes longer than 5 minutes I set a todo WITH A DUE DATE. Usually end of day but occasionally longer. You don’t need a fancy ‘Getting things done’ app to take care of it, notepad can be enough, whatever it takes to make yourself honest. If a reply is expected let them know you are working on it, where it sits in your queue and when they can expect to see the result. This doesn’t go over well in the beginning but if you consistently deliver on projected results you’ll build credibility and people will respect your replies (usually).

Second Rule

Your inbox is not your information repository. Find somewhere else for your information to live. This may be Evernote, a blog, a wiki, a folder on your filesystem, a personal Tiddywiki or some other tool. Make sure it is searchable and make sure it’s backed up. It’s important to ensure you are not an information gate keeper, so publish this stuff. Make sure it’s consumable by others, when appropriate, and always consumable by you.

Feedback loop

Finally, the more email you send the more often you’ll get emailed, it’s pretty basic. Don’t send out WTFBBQ messages yourself, don’t forward clever things, and try to send out less emails and make the ones you send more focused on content.