Did you know 26% of employees admit email is their number 1 distraction?
Email can be a distraction.
Email can be unproductive.
Email is not evil.
The most ah-mazing leaders I know use strategies to manage email to have more impact and influence on a daily basis.
Here are five of my favorite strategies:
Invest 15 minutes – yep, you hear me say this all the time. Handle email in 15-minute increments. Set the timer on your iPhone, play a game and answer as many as you can. Then move onto a more strategic activity.
Unroll.me – this fabulous tool allows you to unsubscribe from emails and subscriptions that are filling up your inbox. Every time you open an email (even if you don’t want to read it) you spend a few seconds. Save time. Unsubscribe.
Freedom – this is a distraction management software I use on my Mac (and iPhone) to block social media sites and email. It will soon release a version for our smart phones… I can’t wait!
Boomerang for Gmail – if you use Google mail this great service allows you to bounce emails back to you when you want to answer them, write emails and schedule delivery for another time – so useful and helps manage inbox overwhelm.
Text Expander – one of my fave apps on my Mac. It allows you to load short cuts for regularly used responses, words, and templates. Saves so much time if you find yourself responding to emails with similar information. Check it out.
What’re your favorite tools?
My friend and social media king Brian Fanzo, follow him @isocialfanz told me about SaneBox which I am going to check out too.
Email is requests of everyone else for YOUR time to achieve THEIR objectives.
Today as a leader, where can you manage your email more effectively so you get time back and invest it in more strategic activities and more important people in your life?
You will have more impact and influence at work, at home, and in your community when you choose to be ah-mazing!
Great post Neen!
That’s such a brilliant point that as a leader, emails you receive are generally other people requesting your time to meet their objectives. And when you send emails you are asking other people to do things.
ActiveInbox is a Gmail add-on built to help you deal with emails exactly like that. It is all about remembering to follow up on things you’ve asked for, and easily prioritizing the things others are asking of you so you can save time.
I love Unroll.me also – genius service and gets rid of so much clutter very quickly!
ooooh I love that – need to check it out Andy. Unroll.me is awesomeness 🙂
Excellent article, Neen. These tools and tips certainly make it easy to tame your unruly (well, more often than not) inbox. Thanks, Niraj (Founder at hiverhq.com)