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Information overload is a prevalent disease of 21st Centuary business life, often predicated by email overload. We live in a predominantly push rather than pull information culture: this is one of the main causes of this disease. However, we have it within our personal power to change that culture and be far more vigilant about what information is thrown at us and often by email.
I have just sent out a reminder email about forthcoming some Brilliant Email Master Classes and was pleased to see that ten people ‘unsubscribe’ from my mailing list. No I am not a sadist, but simply delighted to see people taking my email best practice medicine.
To manage the risk of catching the information overload virus you need to be be ruthless about the emails which reach your inbox and hence reduce the email overload. In the first instance that means ‘unsubscribing’ from any mailing lists (internal and external) from which you receive information which you feel is not useful to you personally.
If that can not be done perhaps because either your mail server does not let you access the website or the sender has provided no unsubscribe mechanism then take alternative avoidance action. Try using:
Simply deleting unnecessary emails is both a waste of time (click here to check for yourself) and makes you very vulnerable to the information overload virus.
Eighty percent of what you really need comes from twenty percent of the information you receive. However, only you can identify which is the twenty percent for you. Then you and only you must prioritise and take suitable measure to avoid being laid low by the email overload and hence information overload disease.
Tags: email best practice, email management, email overload
Email overload – ask someone to do something and the response is email me! How rude is that? Last week’s post on our total reliance on email was popular. That and my current client work prompted me to post a second blog on this theme of when to use an alternative to email.
One of the most annoying comment I receive when phoning someone is ‘can you put that in an email’. If it’s a client sometimes it’s hard to say ‘no’, but with everyone else my solution is to forget! This has cost some people money as the call was to remind them to invoice me for their commission fee.
I find this the rudest response. If you have been asked to do a task, why do you need it in email? Are you suffering with dementia? Do you not have a device on which to make your own ‘To Do List’ (electronic or paper and pencil). Is it plain lazyness? Perhaps is it that you want an audit trail?
In my pocket/handbag there is always a pen and paper but perhaps that is because my parents owned a stationary business and my love of pens and paper has never left me!
Seriously, if someone asks you to do something, my management school says it is now your problem to remember and get on with it, but certainly not respond with ‘ can you put it an email’. That just compounds the cover my backside and litigious culture which now pervades most organisations.
The only exception is if you are having a corridor conversation in which you are seeding an idea with a senior executive.
What is your opinion and experience.
Tags: email best practice, email management, email overload, pen and paper
When a team manages an inbox what is best way to ensure every email is dealt with and keep track of outstanding actions (for example boss’s; sales@;info@) Here are some top tips on team email management.
Team Inbox Management
The PA/EA and manager relationship is always interesting if only because few talk about how best to handle the email. For example:
Here are three simple tips for team email management to save some time and reduce the email overload.
What are your top tips for handling a team inbox?
Tags: email best practice, email management, email overload, Team email management, Team inbox
Email Addiction. Are we becoming email junkies? Did you log in on Christmas Day? Judging by the results some of us are real email junkies with a severe case of email addiction. My thanks to all 722 people who participated in the poll.
Forty five percent (45%) confessed to checking their email. Men checked more often than women see below. However, more women checked their email once and both sexes were equal when it came to checking twice. Does anyone have any thoughts on this one?
Reason for checking in ranged from ‘self-confessed email junkie’ to feeling one must always be available. Of those who did not log in, most said it was time to be with the family and they were too busy cooking and entertaining.
The results leave me wondering just how much we have come to let email dominate our lives and how many people suffer with acute email addiction.
Tags: email addiction, email management
Are you an email junkie? Email addiction is a costly to you and your business (even you love life). We become distracted from the task in hand. It drives up stress levels. In can also be the underlying source of chronic email overload and poor email etiquette as your respond in haste to new emails.
Are you an email junkie? Check -download our Email Addiction self-assessment tool.
Here are three more tips to help you on the road to being less of an email junkie and freeing up some time for other tasks which might have a more positive impact on your productivity and health.
Tags: email addiction, email management, email overload
