Month: March 2008

Yesterday I spoke about the success I had with Inbox Zero at work. That should make starting the day today much easier.

However, I was not as successful cleaning through my inbox at home as I hoped. This is what happened – I have become successful at removing junk and clutter from my home inbox, so none of that was present. Instead, the 30 or so emails I have there all require either Defer or Do (to relate to the 5 options for handling email).

This is the bottleneck; they all require work.

The items that have been deferred are the ones I am handling first. I am taking the main point and scheduling time to handle each of them. Alternatively, I am starting to do them as well. This is the gap – each of them requires a chunk of time to accomplish what is in the email or what it is reminding me to do.

My strategy? I see it as two-fold:

1. Handle all new email as they arrive, selecting to Delete, Delegate, Respond, Defer, or Do it so they do not increase my work later on. Begin to keep up from now on.
2. Handle 2-3 emails already in my inbox each day until I am caught up.

This seems realistic for me, and I have found that having the greatest plans in the world will amount to nothing if I cannot implement them.  I will report back . . .

I have heard some colleagues speak about Inbox Zero, and this is exactly what I accomplished before I left the office on Friday.

What is it? Inbox Zero is a strategy to end the day with nothing in my inbox. Not a single email. Nothing read (those should be either deleted or filed) and nothing unread. Empty. Clean. Ready for Monday. A new start. No longer overwhelmed. Not lost in data. Caught up. Free.

Got the picture?

When Monday morning at the office comes, I will start up Outlook and know that anything that arrives from Friday night to Monday morning will be new and need attending. As this was a major accomplishment for me, I will struggle to remain caught up.

There is a great slideshow that demonstrates this, and I liked the five immediate options for handling email (delete, delegate, respond, defer, do) that Merlin Mann developed, all of which get it out of the Inbox. Hopefully having those references here will better help others process the sheer quantity of stuff we get bombarded with every day.

One thing I learned along the way is that while some email has information in it I need for upcoming tasks, I still file those in folders using keywords and then put tasks on my calendar to complete the items later. I don’t forget them, and have things organized for future reference. I then know where to find the filed information without having it taking up space and needing to be constantly re-read in the Inbox.

Next step is to bring this to my home Inbox, which is pretty clean already, but another hour or so, and it should also be Inbox Zero.