An overflowing inbox is the enemy of productivity. You’ll never get through it, and people who need your response will be left hanging. One way you can use your inbox to your advantage is to tell people how to best work with you, even if that means forcing them away from the keys.Over at Six Pixels of Separation, Mitch Joel, President of Twist Image, suggests that one way to help keep your inbox tidy is to just be ruthless about it and to use your email as an educating tool to help others learn the best way to work with you. For example, he points to those people who reply-all to a message with a long CC list with “ok”, just to validate in front of everyone that they received it.
He says that message has no value, and could have easily been avoided if the sender asked all recipients to reply directly to them with concerns, or ended the message with “no need to respond, I just wanted you all to be aware of this”. Even better, you can foot your messages with “if you have any questions, give me a call” and avoid the inbox altogether. Would people at your workplace obey suggestions like this, or is it a lost cause at your office? Sound off in the comments.
5 Ways to Survive Your Inbox [Six Pixels of Separation by Twist Image]
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