#A2TInbox – Click the STAR to like this post! Comment below and tell me if you are an email collector or prefer to keep your inbox cleared out.
September 30, 2021
I don’t know about you, but I get a ton of emails, both at work and at home. And for work, I have 2 different email systems I use for communicating with coworkers, the organization, parents, schools I work with, and students. At home, I am juggling emails for my kids, our extracurriculars and commitments, family and friends, bills, travel and entertainment. They can really add up. If you are interested on when to find time to work that in, check out a prior blog post about setting a weekly date with yourself HERE. But that isn’t the focus of this post. I want to share how you can use it as a task list.
Let those inboxes work to your advantage and be used to guide your progress each week.
SEPARATE EMAIL FOR WORK AND PERSONAL It may seem like a good idea to have one account, but it can get overwhelming, especially if you run your own business. A best practice is to have one for personal and one for work to focus on during those times. If you have more than one job or run a business or side gigs, like so many do these days, consolidate! This will also allow you to have a professional address to give out for interviews, work connections, etc. But make sure your personal one isn’t too tacky either, especially if you have kids. It’s awkward to email a parent about their child and send it to juicybooty@randomemailaddress.com.
FLAGS, REMINDERS AND CALENDARS These tools are already built into most email domains, or you can set it up to go through Microsoft Outlook on your computer, regardless of what domain you are using. Flags can allow you to mark something important that you will need to do, but may not be able to tackle now due to time or needing information. Reminders are great for things that have deadlines to meet and can even set up alerts. For appointments, tasks and meetings with times designated, dragging these items to your calendar will let you block time off to complete it. I have even done this with emails that are about projects so that I have all the details right there in the email and time set aside to complete it. (I do still keep it flagged and in my inbox until complete)
CREATE FILE FOLDERS WITHIN THE INBOX Some emails we don’t want to delete, even when we finish them. Creating a file folder within your inbox gives you a place to save it and find it later. I get all my receipts sent electronically and file them away for that year. I have one for school and each of our extracurricular activities, and entertainment files. I do not want to lose that recipe, but it doesn’t need to stay in my inbox. Do set up a time the first week of the year (or quarter) to go through each folder and clear it out, and be sure to clear deleted items and sent items on a monthly basis to save on storage.
UNSUBSCRIBE OR BLOCK JUNK We all end up on mailing lists from time to time, but we don’t have to stay on them. If it isn’t useful, look for that unsubscribe link in the message or login to it and manage your preferences. If that isn’t an option or it doesn’t cut them out, you can block the email address or domain from sending you anything at all. Then just delete the message. Don’t give up valuable mental space or digital storage to things you don’t need.
EMAIL YOURSELF It never fails, I have a flash of a brilliant idea for a lesson on the weekend or I think of a chore or call I need to make while at work but can’t do then. Other times I will have a conversation and commit to doing something and don’t want to forget. I just send myself an email! This allows me to keep it in my inbox until I have a chance to complete the task, then I can delete it and move on. When committing to something after an important conversation, this can also act as a summary follow up to send to you and the other person to make sure you have the details right. I also CC myself on important emails so I get a copy to file away for future reference.
I’ve been doing this since I started using email, but until my supervisor shared it in a weekly update last week, I never thought about sharing the idea with others. I should have.
Some of my friends and coworkers are email collectors, with an inbox with hundreds of messages, many of them unread messages. Some of you reading this right now know it’s you.
Some of us are borderline obsessive about keeping it cleared out. That notification and unread message number makes us ache.
Whichever camp you fit into, start putting that inbox to work and let it help you become more productive.
Be sure to click the STAR to like this post and comment below and tell me if you are an email collector or prefer to keep your inbox cleared out. Also, be sure to share this blog with other teachers, and subscribe so future blogs come straight to your inbox! I blog about teaching, but also food, family, travel and other inspirations! You can also find me on Twitter (@addictedtoteac1), Facebook (Addicted2Teaching) or even on YouTube to check out some videos before I just focused on blogging (Sonya Barnes – Addicted to Teaching) and join the conversation, get more ideas, share your story or just interact with me.