Email Control

As I was enjoying lunch with friends today, one admitted to saving lots of emails, just in case she may want them later. My first reaction was to reach for my phone to schedule an organizing session with her. This inspired me for today's blog.

So let me give you some tips on managing your emails:

1. Schedule specific time each day for emails rather than reading them the second they pop into your mailbox. This is where many of us waste huge amounts of time each day. If you don't take the appropriate time to read and answer your emails, you will waste time reading a message once, twice, three times, even more before you act on it. Just read it once, reply, do whatever action is needed and file or delete the email. Complete the task and then move on.

2. Create folders for various topics or people and file only the emails that you will truly refer back to again. Keeping all of your emails in one mailbox, will again cause you to waste time searching for it amongst the thousands.

3. If you need to take more time to find an answer for someone's request in an email, then quickly reply to them that you are working on this and when you plan to have their answer. Then flag the email, so that you remember to follow through. And put it on your calendar so that you make time to complete the task

4. Delete! Delete! Delete!
Delete emails that you will no longer need. Clutter comes in lots of forms - paper, digital, stuff - and none of it is good for you.

5. If you receive emails that you no longer want, then simply unsubscribe. One or two clicks is all it usually takes.

I hope this helps you. Please let me know how you control your emails.

Organizing Myths

Have you ever heard yourself say, "I'll get to these papers when I have some free time." Seriously?

How much free time do you have in a day? Maybe you have a few minutes a day totaling maybe an hour or two a week. Most of you probably have even less spare time.

So, in that free time you would like to...File? I'm guessing that was not the first thing that came to mind. No, sorting and filing papers is not usually thought of as America's number one past time.

So this brings me to a very big misconception that many people have about organizing: They'll get to it in their free time. In order to be organized, you'll want to make time, and yes that means scheduling it. Schedule organizing daily or at the minimum once a week. Work it into your daily routine starting Today!

Disorganization's best friend is procrastination.

So now you're asking what do I do with all these papers?

1. Take a pile of papers and sort them into these categories:
shred (most of the papers will be in this category)
file (only if you will truly refer to it in the future)
action (needs some type of action such as reading, phone call, fill-out and mail, payment, etc)
relocate (belongs elsewhere in the home or office)

2. Each day for the rest of this week, spend a few minutes accomplishing these tasks. Tuesday do the shredding, Wednesday do the filing, Thursday complete the necessary actions, and Friday relocate any papers that belong elsewhere.

3. Now as papers come into your home or office try practicing the rule of handling it only once. Put it where it belongs now. And if it needs action, put a post-it note on it to remind you what is needed and set it in a specific inbox or basket for you to do.

Try this for a couple of weeks and let me know how's it going.