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Everything has a place
As you may know, I’m a big fan of the “inbox zero” concept. Things come into my email inbox, I deal with them, and I clean it out. I find that when people struggle with keeping their inbox clean, they tend to fall into three groups:
- People that aren’t at a computer frequently enough during the day.
- People that have dreams of replying to emails that will never happen (and should delete more emails right away)
- People that use it as a filing system, to-do list, or otherwise just don’t have any good place to store their ideas, notes, and tasks. I think email can be a wonderful tool, but it’s not meant for any of those things.
Today is a look at the “processing” phase of the digital efficiency framework. Things may come at you from various places (phone calls, Slack messages, ideas in the shower), but they can all be treated similarly. Here is how to set up systems to handle anything that comes your way.
The key to remember is that all inputs must process to zero. These inputs can come from email (a lot of them!), notes to yourself, phone calls, sites you read, etc.
When it comes to inputs, particularly email, many items just need a response or a forward or a quick task done. You should knock those out and archive the email. In many other cases, though, there are a variety of things…
