Regularly checking email is an everyday task that’s impossible to avoid, and no matter how diligent you are in hitting “reply all,” managing a mounting email inbox is easier said than done. And if you’re less diligent—as in, you’re more prone to letting your emails pile up unaddressed—that lack of inbox organization (and the anxiety of being in email debt) is likely affecting your productivity more than you realize. Luckily there’s a way out of the chaotic inbox hole. In an effort to better manage our unruly inboxes, we tapped productivity pros for time-saving (read: life-saving) email management hacks that’ll bring us that much closer to the seemingly elusive “Inbox Zero.” Reading emails on a rolling basis as they cascade into your inbox ultimately hampers productivity. For professions where constant communication is crucial, establishing a schedule might not be realistic. But if you take a long, hard look at your job, you may find that it’s doable to designate email-reading time, say, every 60 or 90 minutes. Set alerts on your calendar until you’re in a routine. If someone really needs to reach you, they’ll email you again, send a direct message, or call. If you skim emails on your phone, mark those you need to follow up on as unread so that you don’t forget to respond later. RELATED: Forget Time Management—Attention Management Is the Better Path to Productivity Create your own email to-do list by opening only those that need your attention. Seek out important emails that require immediate responses (e.g., for priority projects or from your boss), and open those messages only—or hit “reply.” Keep the reply window open on your computer, or leave the draft pending in the drafts folder. There’s your to-do list: this stack of replies. Use your prescribed email time to write thoughtful, cogent responses, rather than attempting to tear through a larger quantity of less relevant stuff. That way your goal can be to accomplish an empty drafts folder, rather than a pristinely empty inbox. It groups together your emails and sends them to you in waves—but only at the exact times of your choosing. “By law, all newsletters must include an unsubscribe link,” Dalton says. “Take the time to click that link to submit your unsubscribe request. It’s a 10-second investment that will pay off in the form of a cleaner inbox.” Dalton also notes that signing up for an email unsubscribe app or service isn’t necessary to rid your inbox of clutter. “Many of those programs actually end up selling your email address to other companies to keep them in business,” she adds. RELATED: How to Clean Out Your Phone Bonus: This also reduces your chances of opening a message with a virus attached. “Quickly do the emails that require less than two minutes of action, and delegate those that require action on someone else’s part,” she says. Immediately unsubscribe from and delete messages that require no action, and defer those notifications that require more than two minutes of action to complete. Lastly, file emails that contain pertinent information to a separate folder so you can locate them more easily in the future. RELATED: The 7 Commandments of Email Etiquette Everyone Should Follow Once all emails of one type, like newsletters, are grouped in their own folder, you can select all and delete unwanted ones with a single click. Find an automatic email sorting setting that works for you and then stick with it. “Save the default response as one of your email signatures so you can easily auto-fill the body of your emails,” she says. Genius, right? Just don’t forget to modify for the recipient and circumstance! RELATED: How to Get Stuff Done While You’re Working From Home “I set up my alias accounts to feed into a single folder,” Dalton says of the tactic she employs for organizing bills and other critical financial documents. “I don’t deal with any of those emails until Friday morning, when I dedicate time to sit down and sort through all of my finances.” We’re talking about that message from your coworker two desks down. Duhigg maintains that “often people are asking questions when they can probably find the answers on their own. And if I don’t reply, they’re going to go find those answers.” How do you implement this kind of thinking without feeling rude? By worrying more about yourself and your own time than the time of others. A mantra to practice: “There’s no reason I should respond to people simply because they email me.” Emptying out your inbox religiously might honestly be a waste of time (and maybe really about something else), says Duhigg. Hitting delete, delete, delete may be satisfying or appear to be productive, but why bother? He poses the question: “Are you doing it because it makes you feel good or because it’s actually useful? And if it’s not useful, maybe you don’t need a clean inbox—and maybe you should stop using that as a barometer of success.” RELATED: 8 Expert Digital Decluttering Tips to Cut Back on Screen Time
