E-mail Waste(land)
Mike Donoghue is a member of a multinational information technology corporation where he collaborates on the communications guidelines and customer relationship strategies affecting the interactions with internal and external clients. He has analyzed, defined, designed and overseen processes for various engagements including product usability and customer satisfaction, best practice enterprise standardization, relationship/branding structures, and distribution effectiveness and direction. He has also established corporate library solutions to provide frameworks for sales, marketing, training, and support divisions.
We receive a tidal wave of e-mails every day. If we’re fortunate, our respective operations teams have disposed of all the viruses and a large number of unwanted messages from spammers. Unfortunately, some get through, along with legitimate e-mails that don’t really require our attention. As a result, many professionals and office personnel are struggling with the overburden of e-mail.
We place ourselves in the role of victim when it comes to e-mail--enslaved by its visual and auditory notifications so that we feel compelled to review it as soon as it shows up. We have an unconscious response mechanism, and unfortunately, by diverting our attention we create an impact to our productivity.
Our time on the job then becomes mismanaged. We read a few letters thinking we’re getting rid of waste or putting a little nugget of information in our brains for later retrieval, but in fact it is a misconception that gives an inappropriate feeling of achievement. Habits can be changed, however. There are a number of things you can do to help address the problem:
Column A, Column B
Taking a page from time management principles, you should try to define the urgency or need outlined in an e-mail and regulate it so that you can decide when (or if) you need to give it your attention soon or at some other point in your schedule where you are free to …
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