Do you often keep emails unread in your inbox for a while to keep as a reminder to do something later or take action?

Let’s be honest for a moment - how long do those emails remain unread and ignored? 😬

Have you also noticed that by doing this it also makes you feel a little manic (check list, check emails, “oh crap yeah, that…” rinse, repeat)

Not only does this prevent you from being able to clean up your inbox (hello zero-inbox satisfaction), it’s also killing your efficiency to not keep everything you want to accomplish in one central place.

So where do you start?

Why Your Inbox is Killing Your Productivity

For starters, let’s acknowledge the fact that an email inbox can be the source of a lot of stress when things funnel in faster than we can manage (do you feel this too?).

The last thing we want to do is add to our own stress by keeping things unread for too long, making it harder for us to start to sort through and manage things moving forward.

How To Organize Things

There are (4) four main categories when it comes to inbox management that can help you start to weed through the mess.

When something comes into your inbox you should be addressing if it needs to be:

Reviewed: something you need to do or look over to accomplish this request. This is usually the place we get stuck (and start to see things pile up).
Delegated: does a team member need to see or address this? Forward it to them now, so they can get started asap!
Deleted: doesn’t require any action moving forward? → delete or archive the message.
Unsubscribed: is this a newsletter or something that no longer interests you? Constantly getting pinged on Slack or Asana, but don’t need the emails? Hit unsubscribe and start to eliminate the clutter from the source!

Tips For Taming The Chaos

When it comes to the “review” category, this tends to be where we get stuck in the loop of keeping things unread for way too long without taking proper action.

Ready for some easy tricks to clean things up? Let’s go!

1 - Eliminate the unread clutter

Go check out what emails you have been keeping UNREAD for a bit, and figure out what needs to happen to cross it off.

And once you make your game plan to get this task done – ARCHIVE OR DELETE the email! No need to keep it unread clogging up your inbox.

⁣⁣

2 - Follow the 2 minute rule

If it takes less than 2 minutes, do it now. Don’t write it down for later. Just get it done.

Not only will you get some of that dopamine going for “doing” something, but that feeling of productivity will push you to keep working & even check a few more off your list.

3 - Schedule time for longer tasks

Need to devote a little more time to it later? Make a game plan, write it down, and schedule for later when you can work on it.

But whatever you do, don’t wait until you “have the time”.

The truth is we have to make time for the things that matter, and plan ahead.

Otherwise when we see open time available on our calendar, we just fill it. So make sure to actually find a time block in your calendar and schedule this time for yourself to accomplish this task!