E-mail like a boss. How to get your inbox to zero.

E-mail is suffocating the way we work. 300.4 BILLION emails were sent and received every day in 2020. On average, an office worker will spend 3.1 hours per day to send 40 and receive 121 e-mails. Often our workday means; we turn on our computer, check our e-mails, we look up after a few hours to grab lunch, have a few meetings, clear more e-mails, then head home. A constant battle to either have an empty inbox, or least no scroll bar. I knew of one CEO who received 1,000 e-mails a day. He had an assistant to his assistant whose sole focus was to filter through this information to figure out what was important and needed attention.

So how do we tackle this onslaught? Napoleon reportedly had a unique way of dealing with his mail: He would only open a few letters which came from “extraordinary couriers,” and would simply leave all the rest unread for three weeks. His reasoning behind this was that minor, non-urgent requests would solve themselves, and that his time was better spent on the few tasks which truly required his attention.

Taking lessons from from an 19th century French emperor, how can you get your inbox to zero?

Step 1 Reduce Your E-mail

Inspired by https://www.nirandfar.com/email-management/

Open-up office hours. Create a set time every week and encourage your team to phone or come to you with their quick questions. For bigger conversations ensure it is saved for the right forum i.e., a work in progress, team meeting, planning meeting
Slow down and delay delivery. When and how quickly you respond creates an “unsaid” expectation that they do it too. If you decide to work outside of standard business hours don’t hit send. Bank them up for normal working hours.
Eliminate unwanted messages and unsubscribe from everything. Be ruthless and only take e-mails from things that matter and you know you will read.
Consider if all the e-mail you receive is best sent to you or is there someone else within your team who has responsibility for some of these requests? If so, communicate who to go to for what.
Communicate your system to others by either adding to the signature of your e-mail or having a permanent out of office notification communicating when you will process e-mail, how long you will take to get back to them, or who to contact who will be able to answer it quicker.

Step 2 Process Your E-mail

Inspired by https://www.fastcompany.com/90357008/using-this-method-could-cut-your-email-time-in-half

Use rules to quickly identify what matters
- Bold and colour any e-mail from your manager, your direct reports, important customers  
- Turn conversation history on to group relevant e-mails together and so you can see the latest in an e-mail trail
- Set up a rule for any e-mails you are cc’d on to automatically send to a REVIEW folder to read later
Schedule when you will spend time process your e-mail. Set up reoccurring appointments in your calendar as reminders and so meetings aren’t booked at this time
Use tags on your e-mail or sort them into folders. Could the Eisenhower matrix be a good structure to use? (see https://www.eisenhower.me/eisenhower-matrix/)

Do It Now if it takes less than 10 minutes. Remember, e-mail creates e-mail. Before you send it, can you talk in person or on the phone? Also Charles Duihigg in his book Smarter Faster Better, talks to how he uses his first response to power through these e-mails. Write the first response that comes to mind, trust your gut, and do not send. Work your way through the e-mails and then work your way through a second time to tidy up the e-mail before sending.
Defer It Move e-mails to either a TASK, SCHEDULE TIME in your calendar, or move to a REVIEW folder. In Outlook you can do this by selecting the e-mail, right mouse click and “move to.”
Delegate It Ask yourself “Is this something only I can do?” If not, forward it on to the person who is best suited to, will get the job done the quickest, has a strength in this task
Dump It Be ruthless. If it is not worth keeping or doesn’t relate to you, get rid of it.

Thanks to algorithms, behavioural science, pings, red dots, and vibrations, we spend our days in reactive mode, convincing ourselves that sitting at our desks typing is “communicating” with our team. Wrong. Let’s manage our e-mail versus it managing us and increase the time we spend with our teams and work on the things that matter.