Should Inbox Zero Be Your Goal? Probably Not.

Most of the blogs I read about being more productive with email focus on reaching inbox zero. No doubt, it’s a worthy cause, but is it the correct objective for you? Probably not.

Most people struggle with keeping their head above water, never mind capturing the holy grail of inbox management; and what does inbox zero really mean anyway? No emails in your inbox at all? Then what do you do with those mails that you simply can’t answer because you are waiting on someone else for a response? I think most of the zero pushers would say, Convert them into tasks or calendar items. What they mean by that is to go through an amazing amount of arduously administrative dragging, dropping and labeling acrobatics in order for you to proclaim, YES! INBOX ZERO! Honestly, I find that display of compulsivity to be beyond that of my Dutch aunt who used to clean her kitchen cupboards every single week. (Yes, she took out every pasta box, can,...

I can imagine being on the other end of being asked to send in the “snow” – your empty inbox at the end of the day with 0 to prioritize, 0 to plan and 0 Today. On first glance, this request may seem a bit over the top. I get it.

If you still feel that way after reading this, then, by all means, feel free to stop, but hopefully, this will shed some light on exactly why we request snowmails, and why exactly 20.

First, you should know that we call them snowmails because the objective is to have lots of white (snow) in your inbox.

Second, I want you to know that this service is for you. It actually takes up quite a bit of resources to monitor “the snow”, but we do it because our experience tells is it’s a game-changer.

Third, it might be helpful to know that before we started requesting snowmails many years ago, the level of adoption of our customers was just a little over 50%, and puzzlingly enough it didn’t matter how excited a...

It was time for new glasses.

My girlfriend, at the time, insisted.

So that weekend we sauntered into the Synoptic store on Strandvejen in swanky Hellerup to buy some cutting edge spectacles from Steen, the sophisticated salesman there. The chosen pair turned out to be Danish designer stainless steel trifocals with lots of scientific reasons for why my vision would improve so as to be on par with Superman's, and why they would cost as much as an Apple computer.

I collected my new gear a week later.

The case, consisting of a pristine white leather outer and a fitted black velvet cushioning inner, while impressive, fell a bit short of justifying the exorbitant price of its contents. Nevertheless, I plopped down the cash - bushels of it, and sauntered, nose in a slightly higher trajectory than when I entered the botique – as one does in Hellerup, and out into the world.

The only problem was that everyone on the street was much blurrier than when I had entered.

My heart sunk....

3 things you can do with an email that not everyone knows about:

1) Create a calendar event
Drag the email to your calendar icon in the lower left-hand side of Outlook. This will allow you to block out time to execute the task in the email. Use this when an email requires 30 minutes or more of your time. If the email has an attachment, copy that first, and paste it in the calendar item once you have created it.

2) Create a contact from an email
Drag the email to your contacts icon in the lower left-hand side of Outlook. This will create a contact with the information.

3) To create a task from an email
Drag the email to your task icon in the lower left-hand side of Outlook. This will create a task using the subject line of the email. If the email has an attachment, copy that first, and paste it in the calendar item once you have created it.

Here is a link to find out more about LeanMail and to register for our Free LeanMail introductory workshop.

Michael Hoffman

If it isn’t obvious yet, 60-minute meetings are not very practical. 

The problem is that we can’t go from one 60-minute meeting to another without a break to enter notes and physically get to the other meeting.  (Much better to do right after the meeting than hours or even days later when so much has been forgotten.) 

Even on-line meetings necessitate some time to transition from one meeting to the next.

50-minute meetings are much better than 60s because they give you that all important 10 minutes to digest, record-keep, and transition; and it’s really easy to do.  Having a bit more of time-constraint also helps people keep to agendas. 

I’ve been having 50, 25 and 15-minute meetings for over a decade and never once has anyone objected, so give it a try.

Here is a link to find out more about LeanMail and to register for our Free LeanMail introductory workshop.

Michael Hoffman

Probably the biggest challenge novice LeanMailers face is writing proper Next Actions (NAs) that make an impact on your brain. When your NAs are generic, your brain struggles to remember what the NAs pertained to. The result, then, is an increase in time-spend, not a decrease — without any return on investment

The reason

Generic NAs don’t hook into your memory, which means that you spend time writing them without receiving time-savings in return. Good intentions going in, but pure rubbish going out.

This is easily solved by getting a better understanding of, and putting more focus on, the WHAT of your NAs. (Remember that a NA is made up of a Who – What combination.

Words like: action, apply, read, follow up, (verbs in general) are not hooks that snag your memory. You need Whats, which are typcially nouns.

Are you saying that we can’t use verbs 

It’s not that you can’t...

1. Sort:

In the Prioritize view, Delete, Archive, assign High or Normal priority. Do this quickly like dealing playing cards. Answer mails that take less than 10 seconds. When you are finished sorting, your view will change to Plan. 

2. Straighten:

Now that the waste is removed, non-actionable emails are archived, and emails needing action are prioritized according to the Pareto Principle or 80/20 rule, add Next Actions (NA’s) and Due dates (When) to put everything in its proper place. Do this deliberately, concentrating on creating brain-hooks by ensuring that the “What” clearly describes what you need to do (avoid generic terms like read, follow up, call, act on, etc.) Do not forget to act upon anything that takes less than 2 minutes. When you are finished sorting, your view will change to Today. 

3. Shine:

Review what you have in front of you today. If NAs are...

Sneak Peek - InstantArchive

Categorization

When we categorize emails, we are doing so in order to be able to locate them quickly and easily. Beginning with that end in mind, since all your mails will be placed in one folder, we should not be thinking in hierarchies (folder in a folder in a folder…) when we create categories; instead, we should understand that we are affixing one or more meta-tags (like #tags) to emails.

With a hierarchical mindset we would be tempted to create complicated multi-word categories like:  Customer – West Coast – Acme tools.

With a meta-tag mindset, we would be thinking more universally.  We might attach two different categories, like: Acme tools (the name of the company), Ball peen hammer (the tool they ordered).

In a hierarchical approach we organize from general to specific.  In a meta-tag or category approach we think of the characteristics that would best help us locate the mail at a later date — afterall,...