{"id":1022,"date":"2014-09-03T06:08:15","date_gmt":"2014-09-03T11:08:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/iip-group.com\/hectic-dad\/?p=1022"},"modified":"2015-06-12T16:20:23","modified_gmt":"2015-06-12T21:20:23","slug":"inbox-zero-aftermath-four-months","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hectic-dad.com\/hectic-dad\/inbox-zero-aftermath-four-months\/","title":{"rendered":"Inbox Zero Aftermath &#8211; Four Months and Counting"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Several months ago, I began a <a title=\"Inbox Zero\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hectic-dad.com\/hectic-dad\/inbox-zero\/\">quest to keep my e-mail inbox in control<\/a><\/span><span class=\"s1\">. Since that time, I\u2019ve had a very good experience at keeping the actual number of e-mails in my inbox at any one time at zero. At most, I might let an e-mail languish for a couple of hours, but I\u2019ve gone to be every single night since I started this process with no e-mails in my inbox.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">This doesn\u2019t mean that I don\u2019t have e-mails that need to be addressed eventually, but every single incoming e-mail has been reviewed. When an e-mail comes in, there are four things that I can do with it:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Read the e-mail in it\u2019s entirety and respond to it<\/li>\n<li>Defer the e-mail for later action<\/li>\n<li>File the e-mail for reference<\/li>\n<li>Delete the e-mail<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Prior to deleting an e-mail, I\u2019ve done a good job of assessing if this is the default action for e-mails from this sender. If that\u2019s the case, then I\u2019ve taken to unsubscribing to that e-mail feed. I\u2019ve been somewhat frustrated with a couple of e-mail senders who continue to send e-mail weeks after the unsubscription process has been completed. But for the most part, when I unsubscribe I quit receiving e-mail within a few days or maybe a week.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">The simple step of actively unsubscribing to e-mail feeds has cut down the number of incoming e-mails a significant amount. This has had the added benefit of distilling my incoming e-mail into items that are of greater importance of me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Because I have fewer e-mails in my inbox, I\u2019ve also found that I am willing to read through the important once and respond to them. David Allen, in <i>Getting Things Done<\/i> talks about using the <b>Two-Minute Rule<\/b>. That is, if you can complete the action called for in an e-mail within two-minutes, you should do it right away. I\u2019ve actually expanded this to a five-minute rule as the number of e-mails in my box at any one time has diminished. This also fits fairly well with my recent shift to trying to use snippets of time to get work done. I\u2019ve discovered that I can safely spend five minutes performing almost any task, and there are lots of five-minute windows available to me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">One issue that I\u2019m still struggling with revolves around the processing of deferred e-mail. I get a lot of e-mail that is only of nominal importance at the moment. For instance, I get about 50 advertising e-mails a day from sources like Best Buy, Apple, Kroger, Wal-Mart, etc. These are often the their weekly advertisements. I only need to review these ads prior to going to the store, or making a list for things to purchase. Therefore, when they arrive, I usually file them in a folder called @Review\/Ads. Then the theory is that I will review the folder before going shopping. Once I\u2019ve reviewed an Ad, I\u2019d also planned on deleting it from the folder. This would keep the folder neat and tidy, with only the most recent ads, containing the most pertinent information. In reality, I\u2019ve gotten into the habit of pretty much ignoring the folder. Occasionally I\u2019ll look at an ad and make a buying decision, but seldom (OK, pretty much 100% of the time) I opt not to delete the e-mail.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">This has created a scenario where there are lots and lots of emails containing ads that have accumulated over time. I\u2019m contemplating simply bulk-erasing everything older than a week in this folder, but I have some reservations. Oftentimes I have saved ads to jog my memory for a purchase that I want to make. Sometimes the ad contained an item that I wanted to consider for a gift. With eight kids, I\u2019m always looking for gift ideas. The issue is that I didn\u2019t differentiate the ads that were saved <i>for a purpose<\/i> versus those that were simply dumped into the folder <i>just in case<\/i> I wanted to review them later.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">This means that I have two different kinds of e-mails in the same folder. This is a demonstration of a <i>not best practice<\/i>, and one that I need to address. I\u2019ve found this scenario in several different folders where I have e-mails doing two different things both residing in the same folder. In some cases I\u2019ve created another folder (or two subfolders) to address this situation. Unfortunately, in many cases I haven\u2019t come up with a good solution.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">So, my latest plan is to go through the @Review\/Ads folder and extract those e-mails that are gift ideas. They will be move to the @Gift Ideas folder (I\u2019m pretty simplistic when it comes to the folder names\u2026they are descriptive to a fault). The remainder of the e-mails will be deleted.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">The @Review\/Ads folder is a fairly straightforward folder to process. There are several other folders that are going to take a lot more thought. Several weeks ago, I created a calendar reminder to address several of my deferral folders. I dutifully have gotten the reminder every week. And I have dutifully either deferred the reminder a couple of times, or simply acknowledged the reminder. Only once over that time period have I actually processed the deferred e-mails.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">With the number of incoming e-mails that I\u2019ve had, the number of deferred e-mails is pretty significant. I know I need to process these. In fact, I\u2019m kind of defeating the purpose of Inbox Zero if I defer e-mails and let them languish elsewhere. All I\u2019m doing is trading a sense of calm and control by having an empty inbox with a foreboding sense of dread that I\u2019ve got hidden folders with hundreds upon hundreds of e-mails waiting for me to decide what needs to be done with them.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">So I\u2019ve been pretty proud of myself for getting my inbox cleaned up, and I\u2019ve been even more pleased with myself for being able to keep the inbox at zero e-mails. While this is a significant accomplishment, I need to take the next step and process through the backlog of deferred e-mails. I\u2019m anticipating learning more about what e-mails I should unsubscribe from, and what other things I can do to reduce the sheer number of incoming email.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">I\u2019m also planning on implementing this process with my physical mail. I\u2019ve been traveling almost non-stop for the past six weeks, so I haven\u2019t spent enough time in my home office to even begin the process of Inbox Zero on my physical mail to any significant degree. But I did take one small step in this direction. During my travel, I delegated the task of getting the mail to my 11 year-old daughter. She not only retrieves the mail, but she then sorts the mail based on who it\u2019s addressed to. We have inboxes for every family member, so she distributes the mail into the inboxes. She\u2019s also getting better at identifying magazines and catalogs and appropriating those out to the correct collection locations. I was somewhat surprised at her initial difficulty in determining which items were catalogs and which were magazines. She pointed out that, for instance, the Eastbay catalog has a lot of text in to, and several athlete stories. To her, this wasn\u2019t a lot different than, for instance <i>Time<\/i> magazine, that has an awful lot of ads. We went over several examples, and after a few false starts, she\u2019s separating magazines and catalogs about as well as I do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">With the start of next month, we will begin a process of mailing off the received e-mail for the five family members who are no longer living in the house. Two are college students, so they will retain our address as their home address for a couple more years. Three have moved out and have begun the process of having their mailing address changed. It\u2019s fascinating how long this takes and how many times the same really old mailing lists are sold and resold. We will continue to get e-mail for the Diaspora family members, but I\u2019m hoping that the quantity will diminish with time. Of course, that probably means that I have to nag them a little bit to update their addresses with those folks who continue to mail them at home.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">The bottom line is that my progress towards Inbox Zero has given me a sense of control over my e-mail, even if it\u2019s a little bit false. I do know that very few important e-mails are slipping through the cracks. This by itself is not only rewarding, but has made me seem much more in control. While I still have a long way to go in getting all my e-mail managed, I\u2019ve come a long way.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">How about you, have you given Inbox Zero a try? If not, what\u2019s stopping you?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Make it a great day!<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Several months ago, I began a quest to keep my e-mail inbox in control. Since that time, I\u2019ve had a very good experience at keeping the actual number of e-mails in my inbox at any one time at zero. At most, I might let an e-mail languish for a couple of hours, but I\u2019ve gone [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8],"tags":[22,44,45,58,129,75,81],"class_list":["post-1022","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-productivity","tag-creativity","tag-housework","tag-inbox-zero","tag-motivational","tag-perfectionist","tag-success","tag-time-management"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Inbox Zero Aftermath - Four Months and Counting -<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hectic-dad.com\/hectic-dad\/inbox-zero-aftermath-four-months\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Inbox Zero Aftermath - Four Months and Counting -\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Several months ago, I began a quest to keep my e-mail inbox in control. 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