Want to be more productive with your inbox? Treat your email inbox like you do a physical mailbox.
Most people pick up all their postal mail, throw half of it away and put the rest in piles. they SORT their incoming mail. What they don’t do is leave their unread mail in the mailbox day after day. Or read it and put it back to read the next day.
They don’t WORK it all at once. They triage it.
Develop the process and habit of processing email daily (which means SORTING and setting reminders) and getting to a point where the inbox is empty at the end of each day. And maybe even every time you visit that inbox…
Why it Works:
By treating your inbox as a digital delivery tool, just as your postal mailbox is a physical mail delivery tool, and disciplining yourself to check for mail less frequently, you develop the productivity advantage of grouping like tasks. Additionally when you adopt the habit of not leaving each message in that inbox (or mailbox) it helps you make a decision as to each message.
This and 99 other email productivity tips is included in our Email Productivity Gems: 100 Points to 100 Precious More Hours resource, which will be available on January 23rd. To join the conversation, and to view our upcoming three free tip filled videos, click here.
