When it comes to e-mail, there is not a lot of things that shock me anymore.  I have seen inboxes with 28,000 e-mails in them. I have seen people who send e-mails to themselves to remind themselves that they need to action an e-mail already in their inbox. I have seen people who have given up and just deleted the lot!  But in a recent workshop on e-mail management at one of the big four banks, a participant shared how his team had been involved in a project to reduce the size (and therefore cost) of their mailboxes.  All of the support and maintenance for these was outsourced, so the costs involved were very tangible.  In the end, by decreasing the size of 100 mailboxes in the team, they have created a saving of $20,000 to $30,000 per year!  Staggering!  Imagine that across the broader organisation of 22,000 mailboxes.

That must be a drop in the ocean though, compared to the actual cost of e-mail in productivity terms.  Another recent conversation with a senior management team within a global financial institution uncovered the fact that these senior managers, who all wanted to spend more time with their people or working on strategic initiatives, were spending up to 5 hours per day just on e-mail.  They were drowning in a sea of CC’s, distribution lists and inbox noise.  And what about the cost of overfull and messy inboxes, the cost of searching for that critical but elusive e-mail you received last month, the cost of spending the first half-hour of the day deleting enough e-mail in response to the dreaded “Your mailbox is full” message.

E-mails cost time, and not just the recipient’s time, but also the sender’s time.  If the e-mail is internal the organisation may pay twice, if it is not adding value!  My goodness, I thought that e-mail was meant to be making us more productive.  The good news is though, it still can.  Although e-mail volumes have shot up for most workers, and become a large contributor to long hours and stress, it is still a fantastic way to communicate, and get information from A to B (or B, C,D and E all at once).  The trick to making e-mail work for you, rather than you working for it, is in understanding its traps and applying a set of principles to managing it.

The common e-mail traps and how to avoid them

E-mail is a core part of modern work life, and whilst it has improved the speed and efficiency of communication enormously, it comes with baggage attached (excuse the pun).  The common e-mail traps that I encounter with workers across the board are:

Making e-mail # 1 – E-mail has become our prime focus during the workday, and often outside of core work hours too.  We must remember that it is just a part of our role – a tube for getting information from one place to another.  It is not the main game, and not what we will be measured against come the end of the year.  We need to learn to make e-mail management a part of our day, to deal with it at regular intervals, and then to put it away to focus on our priorities and commitments. 

• Turn off e-mail alerts and alarms, they are just distractions from other work
• Check e-mail at regular intervals, between 3 and 6 times per day
• Check handheld e-mail devices at appropriate times, but turn off when it is time to focus

Too many e-mails – 30, 50, 100 per day and counting.  I recently worked with two poor souls who were getting over 1000 e-mails per day! Ridiculous!  Many feel that they cannot control what is sent to them, but with some concerted effort and creativity you can slash the deluge to a more manageable flow.

• Get off unnecessary distribution lists and e-mail subscription lists
• Discuss your expectations with your team about when and what to CC you on
• Set up e-mail rules to automatically delete or move (file) informational e-mails
• Send less e-mails (you will receive less as a result)

Overfull Inboxes – Messy, overfull and back-logged inboxes cause stress, delays, confusion and rework.  Many workers use their Inbox as a to-do list, and the act of checking e-mail is often an advanced form of procrastination.  The inbox ends up as an unruly mix of stuff you have not looked at yet mixed in with existing e-mails that need action, or should be deleted or filed. For the truly in-control e-mail manager, the Inbox is a delivery dock.  And just like the delivery dock of a supermarket, it should be cleared, to zero, weekly, if not daily.

• Set up a simple filing system (1 – 10 folders) to keep necessary e-mail

Poorly written e-mail – One of the stresses associated with e-mail is the irrational feeling that we need to respond to every e-mail.  We know this is not true, but it feels that way sometimes.  But, even with the percentage that we do need to respond to, time can be saved by learning to compose e-mails in a clear, efficient manner.  The clearer your e-mail is to the reader, the more cut-through you will have, and the more likely they are to action your e-mail in a timely way.  Remember, your e-mail for them is probably just one of 100 that day.

• Write clear subject lines with impact – most people scan, so stand out from the crowd
• State any actions required and due dates in the first line or two of the e-mail

In a world where time is money, and human resources account for the largest chunk of any organisations overheads, it seems a no-brainer to get better at managing the effect that e-mail has on our productivity.  Rather than organisations putting pressure on staff to work longer hours to get things done, why not focus on helping them make their core workday more productive.  The savings could be huge, and I promise you, everyone will be happier!

Source:
Dermot Crowley - Founder
Adapt Training