Do you get an endless stream of emails?

Do you feel behind on email despite spending countless hours trying to catch up on your email?

Are you faced with information overload?

Many people have a love/hate relationship with email. It continues to be a fantastic way to communicate. But it can quickly make us feel as though we have time for little else but email.

If any of the above questions strike a chord, read on for some simple solutions to reduce your email volume.

1) Encourage direct reports not to cc you. Managers often tell me that their employees cc them on every email. Wow! This sounds extremely redundant to me. If one person is responsible for something, surely we don’t need another person watching over their shoulder.  Regular, verbal updates are often a much more effective way to stay abreast.

2) Automatically sort non-urgent emails. I learn a lot through enewsletters and online seminars. Consequently I receive countless emails on these topics. So much so that I started spending too much time learning and not enough time on my priorities. I solved this by setting up rules to have these types of emails automatically routed into a folder. Now I can go through these types of emails at one time during my allocated learning time.  (Contact us for quick instructions on how to set up a rule.)

3) Pick up the phone. Email is best used for simple discussions.  When things get complex (or contentious), it’s time to pick up the phone.  I like the rule of three: if an email goes back and forth three times, it warrants a verbal conversation.

4) Slow down. Are you trying to do too much? Everything we’re involved with comes with its own set of emails. Instead, try focusing on a few projects at a time. Get them done quickly and then introduce a few new ones.

5) Park it. At the end of the day, email is only one component of our job. We need to turn it off and make time for other priorities. And yes, sometimes it is as simple as turning it off.