Many people know the trap of “just quickly checking emails” to then find themselves 2 hours later still piling through, while they should have finished a different task in the meantime.
A lot of people like to schedule times throughout the day during which they work through their emails. When using this method, however, it is important to keep in mind to let people inside and outside of your organisation know when they can expect an answer from you. This is certainly not everyone’s cup of tea and there is more than one way to ensure not getting sucked into the “black whole of emails”.
Our very own Productivity Ninja, Grace, recommends the “When-Then” strategy for emails. The when is not necessarily a set time but an action that needs to be completed before you dive into emails, so for example:
“When I have finished this piece of work, then I will look at my emails.”
Or in this case, you might want to say:
“When I have finished reading this blog post and Grace’s blog post, then I will look at my emails for 20 minutes.”
Have you tried the When – Then method before? What is your email approach?
Let us know @thinkproductive.
By Hannah Urbanek