Zero Inbox - it`s such a relief and productivity boost!

I started an experiment when I came home from my summer holidays in late June this year. Opening up my email client and finding myself with more than 800 unread email messages I made the decision to work on zero-inbox. Attention – spoiler alarm: switching from Mail to Outlook doesn’t do the trick. ??

No excuses

I wouldn`t say that I`m not organized or focused. The unread emails in my inbox just started to add up over time. Traveling a lot, being in meeting after meeting, working in a very transactional sales business: excuses I had a lot. But I felt that it just massively reduced my productivity, distracted me from the most relevant tasks and made it difficult to stay focused.

Finish every day with zero inbox

6 months later I finish (almost) every day with a zero inbox. It wasn’t as hard as I expected at first. And you know what: it`s such a relief and productivity boost!

Here are my 5 principles I turned into routine over the past 6 months:

 1. Plan your next day – and the day after, and……

No one has endless time available. No matter how long you work, there will always be something unfinished. So every day I plan out my next day, and the day after. And not just the meetings and customer visits. But also time to work on the quote a customer has requested in his last email. And yes: I schedule the time I expect the task will take in my calendar. Task by task. Otherwise I would not be able to tell how much time I do have left for each day. And I would just end up firefighting.

2. CC`ing is the plague of the 21st century

It`s easy to put everyone in the company in CC – just to avoid someone can complain about not being informed. I try to use it wisely. And if someone CC`s me, my assumption is, that there is no actual task for me to do. So these messages get marked as read immediately. I can go back to the message when needed.

3. Use the telephone more often

We do everything with our smartphones – besides talking on the phone. How often did I end up with email subjects like: “Re 27: about XYZ”. If I would have picked up the phone we could have solved it in 2 minutes. But no! We`ve ended up with an email conversation taking our attention from time to time over the 5 last days. Where`s the sense in doing so?

4. Reduce the email flood before it arises

How relevant are all the newsletters you signed up for in fact for your daily business, your life? How many of them do you really read regularly? And which ones do have changed your life in a way that you definitely do not want to miss them? O.k. – now you know which ones you can unsubscribe from.

5. Always have an eye on your inbox

This advice is absolutely contrary to many other opinions on how to get to zero-inbox. And it really depends on your personality if you would like to follow it or stick with the more common advices. When starting the experiment I read some blog posts on the topic and got advice like:

-         Turn off beeps and inbox notifications for the inbox

-         Check your emails only periodically at intervals

-         Don`t read emails while on holiday or after working hours

For me this didn’t work out. I`ve ended up with too many emails and I found myself more comfortable with regularly checking emails and prioritizing them instantly (even deleting or marking them as read immediately).  

So nothing really new in here, right? It`s more about getting started, finding your way to reduce the number of unread messages in your inbox and then consequently following your email principles.

 I`d be happy to learn about your experiences. Share them with me in the comments.

Yours

Alex