Having an overflowing inbox full of unread messages damages your productivity in a number of ways. It allows important messages to be missed, and you’ll end up wasting hours sorting through them and trying to find specific messages. There’s no great secret to getting your inbox under control, you just need to develop some good habits. Here’s 5 habits that you should develop to get to Inbox 0. There’s no need to do all at once (although you’ll get the most dramatic results if you do), just pick one or two and work on them consciously until they become second nature, then add another one and another one until your inbox problems are a thing of the past.
- If you don’t need to receive something, get rid of it. Unsubscribe, mark it as junk, create a rule to delete it immediately.
- Don’t make a heap of folders and rules that just move the problem out of your inbox into separate folders. Select your groups carefully and try to stick to around 5-10 folders, preferably closer to 5
- Make full use of your email systems organisational tools. Use flags, rules, categories etc to get your emails sorted before you even see them
- Don’t handle things multiple times. If you can deal with it in 30 seconds or less, deal with it immediately. If you need to spend longer on it, flag it for followup, but schedule the time to do it into your day/week/month
- Remember that you control your inbox – it doesn’t control you. Shut it down altogether, or turn off notifications and don’t let it distract you throughout the day. It’s fine to check it regularly, but do it on your schedule.
If you start incorporating these practices into your workflow, it won’t be long before you see results and dealing with your email becomes a less daunting part of your day.
