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Solving the email conundrum

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AT the recent Arabian Travel Market, I bumped into a gentleman who is a regular reader of this column. I’m always happy to meet people who actually read my ramblings and my delight was hardly dented when he told me that, while he enjoys reading my rants about various aspects of our industry, he would much prefer if the columns would deliver more operationally useful information.


My argument that rants can be highly operationally useful didn’t really hit home, so I promised him that my next column would be full of usefulness.


Back home, I racked my brain and just when I thought I had the first glimpse of the perfect topic, my thoughts were interrupted by several emails hitting my inbox virtually simultaneously. So I did the only thing possible: I decided to write about emails.


Did you know that the first email was sent in 1971 and that it is believed that the text it contained was quite simply the top rows of keys on the keyboard? Some might argue that, content-wise, emails haven’t evolved much since then, but I’m mindful that this column shouldn’t turn into a rant about email, so let’s focus on the tremendous benefits email has brought us.


We can now communicate with people from all around the world conveniently and quickly by email and, since 2004, can even do so with added pictures and other media files attached.


Perhaps surprisingly, I’m a big fan of email. It’s still one of my favourite communication channels, however, over the past year I noticed that it has increasingly impacted my productivity. Email volumes seem to increase almost daily and even in my little company, where we don’t really use emails to communicate (mostly because emailing your colleague in the same office who sits next to you is considered a bit naff), we get more and more online epistles from outside sources.


Add to that the emails I receive in my personal accounts and I found myself permanently staring at ever expanding inboxes. I don’t know about you, but there’s something depressing about starting your day and looking at countless emails in your inbox.


It gave me the heebie jeebies, so I decided to change it and implement “Inbox Zero”. I took an afternoon off and replied to, filed, or deleted every single email in my inboxes. I then created a “Follow-Up” folder for each mailbox. I also restricted the times I check my emails to three times per day: morning, after lunch, and early evening. Oh, and I restricted the number of emails that come to my smartphone.


Now, every email that arrives in my inbox is replied to more or less immediately (on the same day), deleted, or filed in the follow-up folder. On workdays, I dedicate an hour each day to follow up on emails in the follow-up folder – mostly stuff that cannot be resolved immediately, e.g. because I’m waiting for somebody to reply or I need to do some work before replying.


For backup purposes, all my emails are copied to one of my two Gmail accounts (one for work, one private one). Gmail’s sophisticated filtering system allows me to prioritise emails and only forward the most important ones to my phone. The others are either filed or deleted.


Emails in which I’m one of more than 20 recipients in the ‘To:’ or ‘CC:’ line are automatically deleted – nothing good ever comes out of emails where you are one of more than 20 recipients.


I also use a browser add-on called Boomerang that allows me to snooze emails and have them automatically pop up again at a time of my choosing. The end result: I finish the day and my inboxes are empty. Automatic sense of achievement. I’m also more focused when replying to emails, because I know I have limited time to do so. Lastly, my lunch or dinner is no longer interrupted by unimportant emails. For me, email has gone back from being stress factor to being a productivity and communication tool. And that’s how it should be.


By Martin Kubler

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