The
Only Five Email Folders Your Inbox Will Ever Need
Stop "organizing"
your emails by subject and start thinking of them in terms of deadlines.
For years, my approach to email was like slaying a hydra. For
every email I deleted, two more landed in my inbox.
Part of the problem, I knew, was the nature of my work. My team
stands between two major organizations within my company, making collaboration
crucial, however inefficient it was in practice. So not only did I put up with
this mess, I was actually complicit in letting it worsen. I saved everything. I
thought most messages addressed directly to me needed my response. I was wrong.
Looking back, I didn't have the discipline and discernment to
really manage my email habits. The system I use now isn’t a product of my own
invention. My best friend works for a major consulting firm, and I was grateful
when he sketched out the rough strategy his firm shares with consultants to
help them manage their own unruly inboxes. The technique comes with all the
beauty and simplicity you'd expect from a firm charging seven figures per
engagement—and it relies on a folder system you can tally on one hand.
The biggest mistake, in my experience, is creating folders based
on topics. Emails, like meetings, rarely stay on track.
My newly streamlined, uncluttered
inbox has a grand total of five folders.
Where do you file an important update that covers two unrelated
projects? What do you do with that same email if it requires a response?
The second mistake I’ve seen, and
personally committed, is trying to use an inbox as a to-do list. There simply
aren't enough hours in the workday to respond to the emails that pile up there.
Over time, precisely because of the way I was
"organizing" my inbox, emails that I should've responded to got
pushed further and further down, and were eventually forgotten.
The system that saved my sanity requires only five folders:
1.
Inbox: the inbox is a holding pen. Emails shouldn’t stay here any longer
than it takes for you to file them into another folder. The exception to this rule
is when you respond immediately and are waiting for an immediate response.
2.
Today: Everything that requires a response today.
3.
This Week: Everything that requires a response before the end of the week.
4.
This Month/Quarter: – Everything that needs a longer-term response. Depending on your
role, you many need a monthly folder. Others can operate on a quarterly basis.
5.
FYI: Most items I receive are informational. If I think I may need to
reference an email again, I'll save it to this folder.
Email will quickly become your master if you don’t take charge. So
once you embrace this system, you need to adhere to it mercilessly—there are no
half measures. We tend to get more lax about newly adopted habits as their
newness rubs off. But I’ve actually gotten better over time at sticking to my
five-folder rule. I’m ruthless about deleting emails that don’t require my
attention. Here are five tips that make the system more effective.
Don’t confuse having an opinion
with leadership, or mounting email volume with weightier job duties.
First, I keep an actual to-do list. Occasionally I’ll add items to
that list based on the content of an email that didn’t require
a response. For example, if an email thread results in deciding that we need to
schedule a meeting, I'll make a note to prep my boss with some information from
those emails—but I'll delete them once I've finished that prep session.
Second, don’t exaggerate your own importance. Too many people want
to have a say in too many things. We all have leadership aspirations—and that's
generally a good thing. One way to grow your influence is indeed by taking on
more responsibility. But don’t confuse having an opinion with leadership, or
mounting email volume with weightier job duties. If you don’t need to respond,
put it in the "FYI" folder or delete it—it's one or the other. And if
you stay on "cc," you’ll get the latest thread when everyone
responds, so there's no need to worry.
Third, don’t exaggerate the
importance of others. A lot of people want responses today.
I’m one of them. But I've learned that I don’t always need or deserve a
response today. This is especially true if you have obligations that directly
impact customers or your company's financial health. Don’t put emails in the
"Today" folder that don’t belong there; if it’s in the
"Today" folder you have to respond to it that day,
no exceptions.
My rule is simple: If my wife asked me to come home early and I
was willing to leave emails in the "Today" folder, that doesn't mean
I need to blast through them once I get home—it means those emails didn’t
belong in that folder to begin with. I try and limit "Today" emails
to messages involving customers, my boss, and urgent projects.
If your work is project-based,
you can create this five-folder system for each project.
Fourth, you can work out of multiple folders simultaneously. Try
to keep the "Today" folder small, for obvious reasons. If it’s empty
and you’ve got time to address longer-term emails, dive into the "This
Week" folder. I typically spend my Friday mornings doing "This
Week" emails. If I don’t have all the information I need, I may begin my
response but save it as a draft, and hold off sending it until I'm all squared
away.
Finally, if your work is project-based, you can create this
five-folder system for each project. You may have two or three projects running
at a time, and technically wind up with 10 to 15 total folders as a result—but
the system still holds. After the project is complete, archive the entire
structure.
Like every new work habit, and especially those involving personal
organization, this one may feel unnatural at first. I found it needed some
getting used to. Soon after I switched to this method, I was still stressed out
because I felt like I was missing something. In reality, though, everything was
completed, and I gradually began to see that. It turned out that I'd gotten used
to feeling the burden of email and was confusing it with productivity. Armed
with just five folders, those days are over.
ZACH
HANLON
https://www.fastcompany.com/3067012/work-smart/the-only-five-email-folders-your-inbox-will-ever-need
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