Throughout the course of the day, you’re likely to get hundreds if not thousands of emails. Before you know it, your inbox looks like a disaster area. You know should keep up the best you can, or you’re likely to drown in the sea of messages. As a result you become glued to your smartphone, hoping to open, answer, forward or delete what you can to avoid the pile up.
Bad idea.
If there’s one thing psychologists have learned as they’ve studied human behavior, it’s that we achieve better results and more excellent results when we focus. Translation . . . you can’t perform at your best when you’re constantly distracted or drowning in email messages.
To end the fight with email, consider the following tips:
- Be ruthless about what gets through your email filter. Unsubscribe from newsletters, offers, RSS feeds, etc. that don’t provide helpful information or resources. Don’t give out your email address until you know how companies might use your information. Also consider setting up a “junk email” that you can give to solicitors.
- Build “email windows” into your schedule. These are pre-scheduled time periods in which you are devoting to composing, returning and processing email. This allows you to focus on the task at hand and do one of three things: do it, delegate it, or delete it.
- Email only during the work day. The people you’re corresponding with come to expect certain behavior from you. If you email back and forth after the work day is over, you’re basically telling them, “it’s ok to correspond with me after hours.” If you want to respond to email after work hours, set it to be delivered the next day so the timestamp is still during working hours.
- Teach those around you to use a “parking lot.” Instead of firing off an email every time they have a question or comment, a “parking lot” encourages employees to keep a list of items that need addressed. Once that list reaches 4 or 5 items, they can schedule a quick phone call or short meeting with you to go over those items.
- Turn off email on your smartphone. Yes, it sounds crazy. But just because you get can email on your phone doesn’t mean you should. If you find that you’re checking your email at the dinner table, the grocery store, red stoplights or in bed, you might be taking it too far. Try going offline with your phone for a while. You might find that you’re more focused and productive. You might also send the message that people need to call you in order to discuss something important. Your family and friends will appreciate your undivided attention as well.
