Who has the most emails…?
I was asked to pitch for some work on delivering a workshop on email etiquette, however there was a bigger question behind it – who has the most emails?
No-one actually knows an ultimate number and very few companies offer guidelines as to what is acceptable in terms of managing them.
Daniel Pink’s book (“To Sell is Human”) begins with his statistics for 2 weeks:-
- 722 emails
- 86 tweets
- 12 texts
My email traffic is not as high however I am sure I send more texts than Mr Pink, does it mean I am more efficient less busy, what conclusions would you draw.
To improve organisational effectiveness is not to focus on the number or volume – the attention should be on some clear guidelines as to how to Lead/manage your in-box rather than it lead you.
Please find below my top tips for taking control:-
- Make an appointment with e-mail do not drift in out of it
- Turn the envelope icon reminder off
- You don’t have to reply to everything
- Set up a good file wall, so spam does go in spam
- Once a month unsubscribe from everything
- Deal with an e-mail that takes less than 2 minutes thinking time
- Set up holding folders so that in-box is always clear (you need the # in front so they go to the top of your folders)
- #Action
- #Waiting for
- #Reading
- Decide acceptable response times as a team
- Create interesting subject lines – questions are great hooks for readers
- Use the same housekeeping principles as a team – all e-mail looks the same
- Pick up the phone – don’t use e-mail for everything
nuggets runs a workshops called – Making e-mail work for “you” – contact me to find out more bev@nuggetsoflearning.co.uk
