Spring Cleaning: Inbox
May 14th, 2007 by Cristina Favreau
Am I the only one who has trouble keeping my Inbox clean?
For the past few months, I’ve been looking at my growing list of messages, and frankly, I was feeling a little overwhelmed seeing all those unresolved messages… You know the ones I mean — important, but not urgent, the ones that take time to formulate and answer — I had a former VA client asking for information on invoices dating to 2004!!! ouf… Anyhow, I finally cleaned up my Inbox and it feels so much better.
My goal is to process email as it comes in… I know it’s not possible to handle ALL messages immediately, but I won’t use that as an excuse.
Productivity is important for entrepreneurs, that’s why I’m so impressed with the participation in Ultimate Guide to Productivity project. I’m learning new tricks to productively run my business and am thankful for reminders (like ‘keep your inbox empty’).
Choose one thing you can do RIGHT NOW to be more productive — and DO IT!! Let us know how it goes.
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UGH – I put so much pressure on myself to keep my in-box clean… I try not to let my in-box get past 50 messages. I’ll either file messages I need to keep, or I’ll handle them and then delete them. If my in-box gets up to 70 messages, I start panicking… it seems like such a silly thing to panic about LOL!
I probably pressure myself because of what you referred to Chris – because if it gets too large, I know there’s unresolved messages lurking in there somewhere LOL!
Ok, so you’re setting a goal to process e-mail as it comes in… I’m going to set the same goal, and for me, I’m going to take it a step further. Each Friday, before I “close” my office for the weekend, I’m going to make it a point to get my in-box down to 30 or less messages.
YIKES – it’s in writing… I’m accountable for that now LOL!
Okay, I’m going to seem really OCD but I can’t stand more than 10. I deal with, file and delete compulsively.
It’s because I don’t use my inbox as a reminder system. If I need to remember to do something, I drag the email into my Calendar and save it exactly when I need to do the follow-up.
http://takechargesolutions.org
It’s not always easy to keep it empty, but if you have to scroll to see some of the messages, you have too many!
Jenn, how did your first week go?? I’m still struggling to keep my messages down but I’m doing much better. I realize I have a nasty habit of “putting it off until later.” At times, ‘later’ comes, like, WEEKS later!!
I also think I’m subscribed to too many newsletters and Yahoo Groups… but that’s another issue!!
Marcia, you don’t sound OCD at all, you sound like a very organized and methodical person. I could learn a lot from you!!! Thanks for the “Take Charge” resource.
Janet, I SOOO agree with you on this… When I have to scroll down to see all my messages, that’s when I know I’ve gone too far (does it count that I use the preview pane??)!!