How to organize and manage your e-mails

Life seems to passing me by. The weeks go by extremely quickly. I’m still shocked that it’s April let alone almost the end of April already. At work everyday is a different day which I enjoy. At the beginning of the day, I look at my Weekly Activity Report which outlines my long-term and short-term goals. I write down my daily goals that I want to achieve along with the meetings that I have and the little things that come up. It seems that it’s the little things that come up and take a portion of my time. E-mail is a big part of that. Part of me thinks that it’s manageable and a useful tool but another part of me things that sometimes it can hinder my goals for the day when more urgent things take place which you find out via e-mail. When I really need to concentrate, I close Microsoft Inbox and focus at the task at hand. Sometimes I wonder how business was conducted before the invention of e-mail. Below is a list of things that I do to manage my e-mails. If you have any other tips or comments, please leave them. I’m always looking for a way to become more efficient.

• Review your daily goals and meetings before opening up your e-mail because sometimes it’s like Pandora’s Box
• Separate out e-mails either by person or project depending on your type of work
• Download or file things immediately from your inbox into your harddrive otherwise you’ll be digging through your e-mails later
• Be descriptive in e-mails so you know what to search for later on
• Try to keep e-mails brief
• Only copy people on e-mails that need to be copied on it
• If you can call someone instead, do it because it’s more efficient and it adds a personal touch
• Turn off your e-mail when you need to focus on a task
• Star items that require follow-up
• Set time aside every week to follow up with people and follow-up with the starred e-mails

I read a great Globe and Mail segment about e-mails where a personal organizers answers various questions:
How to organize and manage your e-mail