Email tips

How many times a day to you check your email? How many hours a week, month, year do you spend on email? 

If you are anything like me the answer is too much.  

How productive was that time? 

Likely not as productive as you tell yourself.  

I get it. Your organization relies heavily on email as the primary means of communication. I once had a senior leader tell me during an initial performance counseling that because she evaluates so many people, one of the primary ways she evaluates performance is how quickly her subordinates responds to her emails. The result… compulsively checking my email just in case she emailed me. This compulsion not only made me less productive at work but never allowed me to get a break from work, as I would check my email at home as well. The good part of technology is you can work anywhere. The bad part of technology is you can work anywhere.

At some point I realized I was wasting much time checking email over and over throughout the days. Here are some strategies I used to break this habit…

1.Disciplined scheduling of time for email.  

I choose 2 times a day to check and respond to email. Same times, Every day. Mid-morning and about the close of business. Find something that works for you. I found mid morning to be useful as it broke me from the habit of wasting time on email once I got to work which I reserved for the most important things I needed to get done for the day. It also provided a break after completing more meaningful complex tasks. Towards the close of business allowed me to address important but non-urgent issues that came up during the day.

2. Refuse to utilize email as a means of urgent communication.  

When organizations utilize email to communicate urgent needs, this inherently reduces productivity as every member of the team must constantly check their email to ensure they can respond to that urgent need promptly. My solution was to not play this game. I made it clear to my teammates that I did not use email in that manner and if there was something urgent that needed to be addressed it needed to be done in person or phone. Closed loop communication. Sent does not mean received. Here is how to do this…

3. Always on “out of office” reply.

You know the out of office reply function you use to tell everyone you are on vacation? Turn it on and never turn it off. Here is the message I used in the reply:

Sir/Ma’am, I check email twice daily at 930AM and 430PM. If there is an important issue that requires my immediate attention, call me at _____. V/r, Paul

This function and response serves multiple purposes. It communicates to the sender that you do not use email for urgent communication and the appropriate way to communicate if urgent communication is required. It encourages your teammates to be thoughtful about what rises to the level of “important” and “immediate.” It communicates when you will be responding to email and with time I observed something interesting… my teammates would disproportionately email me at either 930 or 430. 

4. Conscious neglect.

Particularly if the email was not addressed solely to me (see below) I would rarely respond. Almost invariably things worked themselves out without having to get involved. I would also use my judgement and if the response was something that the sender could reasonably get the answer to on their own I would let it go.