WEBVTT - Get Better At Email 0:00:01.400 --> 0:00:05.160 What do you think about my general presence on email? 0:00:06.920 --> 0:00:09.200 I would say you're not the best of email. I 0:00:09.280 --> 0:00:12.040 just think you missed things. Sometimes. The problem with you 0:00:12.119 --> 0:00:17.040 and sending emails is that it's very unpredictable when you 0:00:17.079 --> 0:00:20.440 will read, if you will read, and when you will reply. 0:00:20.960 --> 0:00:23.160 First time I met you, I was introduced to you. 0:00:23.160 --> 0:00:25.320 You gave me your business card and said here, this 0:00:25.400 --> 0:00:27.560 is my email if you need to get in touch, 0:00:28.000 --> 0:00:32.760 and so literally like that night, I emailed you and said, hey, 0:00:33.040 --> 0:00:35.160 it was nice to meet you. Here are some things 0:00:35.200 --> 0:00:39.040 that would be helpful, and I never heard back. Once 0:00:39.560 --> 0:00:41.720 I sent an email saying, hey, I really want to 0:00:41.760 --> 0:00:43.919 go to this conference. I need to sign up for 0:00:44.000 --> 0:00:47.440 it by Friday and it's Wednesday. Do you think I 0:00:47.479 --> 0:00:50.640 can do it? And I kind of forgot about it, 0:00:50.760 --> 0:00:54.040 and then I didn't hear back from you. So by 0:00:54.040 --> 0:00:56.120 the time that we did get around and discussing it, 0:00:56.120 --> 0:00:57.880 it was the next week I didn't get to go. 0:00:58.560 --> 0:01:01.000 So more often than not, I just wander over and 0:01:01.120 --> 0:01:05.520 talk to you. Definitely no to harass you on chat, 0:01:06.280 --> 0:01:10.400 and if all else fails to engage with you in person, 0:01:11.600 --> 0:01:13.760 and then I guess if that if if you're still 0:01:13.840 --> 0:01:18.800 am I, I might go to to your boss, where 0:01:18.840 --> 0:01:20.560 would you say I rank and like among all the 0:01:20.560 --> 0:01:22.800 people you work with? Am I like the worst about email? 0:01:23.000 --> 0:01:24.800 Or am I? Am I in the middle? Or am 0:01:24.800 --> 0:01:27.800 I close to the bottom. I don't think you're at 0:01:27.800 --> 0:01:32.200 the very bottom, but you're near the bottom if we're 0:01:32.240 --> 0:01:44.240 being honest. So what you just heard was a bunch 0:01:44.280 --> 0:01:49.120 of my colleagues totally dissing my email habits. I knew 0:01:49.160 --> 0:01:51.840 I wasn't great an email, but I didn't realize I 0:01:51.880 --> 0:01:56.320 was making everyone else's lives that much harder. This week 0:01:56.320 --> 0:01:59.400 on Works for Me, I try to fix it. Um. 0:02:08.960 --> 0:02:11.679 Welcome to Works for Me, the show where we improve 0:02:11.760 --> 0:02:15.320 ourselves using productivity hats to see if they'll work for you. 0:02:15.840 --> 0:02:19.160 I'm back at Greenfield, and I'm Francesca leaving. This week 0:02:19.200 --> 0:02:22.400 it is Francesca's turn to change something about the way 0:02:22.440 --> 0:02:27.400 she works. Francesca, what's bothering you about your productivity? This week? 0:02:28.560 --> 0:02:34.120 I'm bad at email, Like, very, very very bad at email. 0:02:35.000 --> 0:02:38.760 My work inbox is so overwhelming that I'm drowning in it. 0:02:38.880 --> 0:02:42.880 I actually miss emails that are pretty important. I just 0:02:42.960 --> 0:02:44.680 won't see them because of all the other stuff that 0:02:44.720 --> 0:02:47.359 comes in and when I do spot a relevant email 0:02:47.400 --> 0:02:49.720 and open it and read it, I don't actually have 0:02:49.760 --> 0:02:53.320 a good system for handling and dispatching each email quickly. 0:02:54.040 --> 0:02:56.440 So I'm hearing two problems. One is that your inbox 0:02:56.560 --> 0:02:58.520 is overwhelming, which is a problem a lot of us have. 0:02:59.800 --> 0:03:02.799 My work email is certainly like that. My personal email 0:03:02.880 --> 0:03:06.680 is definitely more under control. Congratulations, thank you. But then 0:03:06.720 --> 0:03:08.720 the other problem I'm hearing is that you haven't figured 0:03:08.760 --> 0:03:12.680 out how to thrive in this chaos. I basically avoid it. 0:03:12.880 --> 0:03:15.080 I see the sheer number of emails and it scares 0:03:15.120 --> 0:03:17.840 me and I go burrow under a rock, which is 0:03:17.880 --> 0:03:21.080 a problem since email is a main form of communication 0:03:21.400 --> 0:03:24.600 for a better worse in our world. To be fair, 0:03:25.520 --> 0:03:28.440 I didn't get into this situational by myself. The modern 0:03:28.480 --> 0:03:31.760 workplace is in an email crisis. We're drowning in a 0:03:31.919 --> 0:03:35.920 deluge of email and jargon. The average corporate employee in 0:03:35.960 --> 0:03:41.000 this two thousand mind you received anywhere from fifty emails 0:03:41.000 --> 0:03:44.240 per day, and it's growing at about fifteen per year. 0:03:44.400 --> 0:03:46.000 So if you do the math, it would double every 0:03:46.000 --> 0:03:48.520 four and a half to five years. That's Phil Simon, 0:03:48.600 --> 0:03:51.960 a professor at Arizona State University. He wrote a book 0:03:52.000 --> 0:03:55.520 called Message Not Received, all about how the corporate world 0:03:55.680 --> 0:03:59.200 is crippled by too much email. He's not wrong. I 0:03:59.280 --> 0:04:01.960 live that problem. Um. I decided to sit down at 0:04:02.000 --> 0:04:04.839 home with my husband Mike and diagnose just how bad 0:04:04.920 --> 0:04:08.240 the problem had gotten. All right, so I'm gonna show 0:04:08.240 --> 0:04:12.040 you one day. One day is worth of email. Okay, 0:04:12.760 --> 0:04:19.520 So this is like there's twenty emails per page, So 0:04:19.680 --> 0:04:28.000 six pages, six times twenty unread well total emails? Is 0:04:28.000 --> 0:04:32.560 that something like all that that you haven't read? Yes? 0:04:34.720 --> 0:04:37.680 Or does this include spam email? I get a lot 0:04:37.720 --> 0:04:41.159 of pr um like public relations firms put you on 0:04:41.279 --> 0:04:44.839 mailing lists, So I have a lot of unwanted mailing 0:04:44.880 --> 0:04:47.600 list emails. So then why don't you just delete them 0:04:47.600 --> 0:04:51.040 if you know you're not going to read them? A 0:04:51.120 --> 0:04:55.479 good question? I mean, I mean I think I get 0:04:55.480 --> 0:04:59.279 overwhelmed because it's so much. Look how close these emails 0:04:59.279 --> 0:05:05.480 came in together, like to seven to one, so they 0:05:05.560 --> 0:05:08.960 just like they just come in like an avalianche checking 0:05:09.000 --> 0:05:11.640 your email. Right, I know, But I to make this 0:05:11.680 --> 0:05:14.680 workout have to be constantly deleting these exactly. That's how 0:05:14.720 --> 0:05:16.560 it works. If you go to lunch and come back 0:05:16.560 --> 0:05:18.960 to your desk and you haven't looked at it for 0:05:19.120 --> 0:05:23.520 thirty minutes, forty minutes, Um, how many new emails would 0:05:23.520 --> 0:05:31.840 it have, say, I would have like new emails. Yeah, 0:05:31.880 --> 0:05:33.760 I mean that's so that's why it's hard for me 0:05:33.800 --> 0:05:37.599 to delete. Yeah, but it sounds like there's also a 0:05:37.600 --> 0:05:40.320 lot of things that you're subscribed to that you should 0:05:40.360 --> 0:05:45.920 just unsubscribe because that's the same effect as deleting emails 0:05:45.960 --> 0:05:51.880 to these pr email spam. These are really insidious, Like 0:05:51.920 --> 0:05:53.479 these are the ones. I think that this is going 0:05:53.520 --> 0:05:55.080 to be the biggest challenge. This is the thing that 0:05:55.120 --> 0:06:01.039 I'm is going to be my um golies. Is that 0:06:01.080 --> 0:06:05.560 the right metaphor going to be my I don't feel 0:06:05.600 --> 0:06:07.560 like that's what I'm looking for, But it's gonna be 0:06:07.640 --> 0:06:11.599 my dragon to slay. It sounds like my custom hausom 0:06:11.600 --> 0:06:15.200 good advice for you, But my inbox definitely looks a 0:06:15.279 --> 0:06:18.479 lot like yours. That's a lot of unwanted things that 0:06:18.600 --> 0:06:22.000 I just don't deal with. That's actually kind of refreshing 0:06:22.040 --> 0:06:24.400 to hear, because I feel like you often have good 0:06:24.440 --> 0:06:27.800 hygiene about these things. Mike just too. I sometimes feel 0:06:27.800 --> 0:06:31.000 like I'm the only one who just doesn't do anything 0:06:31.040 --> 0:06:44.479 about these emails. Okay, so everybody is sending too many emails, 0:06:44.480 --> 0:06:47.000 it's not just you, but you sound like you have 0:06:47.120 --> 0:06:51.400 a pretty big problem here. You're getting a lot of emails, 0:06:51.400 --> 0:06:55.279 but you're also not responding to them quickly or at all. 0:06:55.640 --> 0:06:58.360 So how are you going to do that? I really 0:06:58.400 --> 0:07:00.680 wanted a solution that didn't require to use any new 0:07:00.680 --> 0:07:04.080 tech or install any apps system that anybody could use 0:07:04.080 --> 0:07:08.600 on any email software. So I'm going classic. I'm doing 0:07:08.680 --> 0:07:11.880 inbox zero. Well, in box zero, so that's like no 0:07:12.040 --> 0:07:16.360 emails in your inbox ever, right, It's actually pretty straightforward philosophy. 0:07:16.480 --> 0:07:18.200 It was developed all the way back in two thousand 0:07:18.280 --> 0:07:22.760 seven by Merlin Man. He's a writer, podcaster and productivity guy. 0:07:22.880 --> 0:07:26.280 And yeah, it's basically a filing system for your electronic mail. 0:07:26.840 --> 0:07:30.000 And just like it sounds, inbox zero dictates that you 0:07:30.040 --> 0:07:33.320 should end every day with an empty inbox, either deleted 0:07:33.480 --> 0:07:37.000 or filed into folders every single email you've gotten. That 0:07:37.080 --> 0:07:39.520 sounds like a lot of time spent on your email. 0:07:39.560 --> 0:07:41.760 And I think that's some of the criticism to inbox 0:07:41.840 --> 0:07:43.840 zero and systems like it, that's that it sets those 0:07:43.840 --> 0:07:46.640 really high expectation and bar for people that they have 0:07:46.760 --> 0:07:50.400 to do this really intense email maintenance every single day. Yeah, 0:07:50.480 --> 0:07:52.440 I think that in all of the years that inbox 0:07:52.520 --> 0:07:55.120 zero has been around as an idea, there's definitely been 0:07:55.120 --> 0:07:57.400 something about backlash to it, and that's part of it 0:07:57.400 --> 0:07:59.400 that it takes so much time, And people also say 0:08:00.000 --> 0:08:02.920 it's kind of a way of feeling productive without being productive, 0:08:02.960 --> 0:08:05.080 because you're just you're spending lots of time doing something, 0:08:05.280 --> 0:08:08.080 but what you're doing is just your email. So I 0:08:08.120 --> 0:08:11.040 get all those criticisms, and I do think there's a 0:08:11.120 --> 0:08:12.560 danger that I'll spend a lot of time on it, 0:08:12.720 --> 0:08:14.920 But I'm also I have to do something like I'm 0:08:14.920 --> 0:08:17.880 in an email emergency right now, so I think I've 0:08:17.880 --> 0:08:21.200 got to try the most extreme thing I know of. Okay, 0:08:21.240 --> 0:08:24.120 so you're going to become an inbox zero person. I'm 0:08:24.160 --> 0:08:27.080 excited for you and your transformation, But what's the exact 0:08:27.120 --> 0:08:31.400 system that you're going to follow to get to invox zero? First, 0:08:31.480 --> 0:08:36.360 I need to set up rules, including folders and filters 0:08:36.400 --> 0:08:40.240 on my email and even just telling people in various 0:08:40.240 --> 0:08:43.240 ways not to email me so much so I don't 0:08:43.240 --> 0:08:46.520 get as many emails in the future that step one. Next, 0:08:47.040 --> 0:08:49.440 I need to get rid of everything sitting in my 0:08:49.520 --> 0:08:52.800 inbox right now, which is a lot, and I don't 0:08:52.840 --> 0:08:56.240 know how long that will take. Finally, every day after that, 0:08:56.320 --> 0:08:59.240 I'm going to assign three twenty minute dashes where I 0:08:59.240 --> 0:09:02.400 can dedicate my self to allotting emails to their proper place. 0:09:03.200 --> 0:09:06.000 It seems like you have it all figured out. How 0:09:06.040 --> 0:09:10.439 will you know whether your experiment is a success. If 0:09:10.480 --> 0:09:12.880 I can spend one week and finish every day with 0:09:12.920 --> 0:09:17.120 an empty inbox, I've one. I've conquered my email problem. 0:09:17.160 --> 0:09:31.680 Good luck. Step one of inbox zero, make some rules. 0:09:32.240 --> 0:09:35.200 I was going to set up folders and filters and 0:09:35.280 --> 0:09:37.440 send a message to my colleagues that I am not 0:09:37.559 --> 0:09:40.959 an email person anymore. This was to try to lower 0:09:41.040 --> 0:09:44.600 the sheer number of emails that I was getting. First, 0:09:44.640 --> 0:09:47.120 I was going to set up some folders. I got 0:09:47.160 --> 0:09:50.119 the idea from a Fast Company article to make folders 0:09:50.640 --> 0:09:53.920 based on time, not by subject. So the folders I 0:09:53.960 --> 0:10:00.079 set up are called today, this week, this month, M, 0:10:00.679 --> 0:10:03.480 and F Y I. F Y I is where everything 0:10:03.480 --> 0:10:05.720 goes that you might need to reference later, but it 0:10:05.760 --> 0:10:09.319 doesn't require a response. I did other things to limit 0:10:09.360 --> 0:10:12.960 how many new emails. I got Phil, our email expert, 0:10:13.000 --> 0:10:15.280 had given me a tip if an email chain goes 0:10:15.559 --> 0:10:19.240 longer than three emails, it should move to another medium. 0:10:19.280 --> 0:10:24.200 So I put that rule in my email signature. This 0:10:24.280 --> 0:10:28.360 turned out to be harder than I expected. This feels 0:10:28.360 --> 0:10:31.840 crazy to put this in my even this to put 0:10:31.840 --> 0:10:45.319 this in my I for email chains longer than three emails, 0:10:46.240 --> 0:11:03.440 please call instead call her message instead. Oh this feels weird. 0:11:05.520 --> 0:11:10.280 All right, I'm going to save it. So it sounds 0:11:10.280 --> 0:11:14.520 like you're having a problem where you're thinking about other 0:11:14.640 --> 0:11:19.880 people more than yourself. Yeah, because you're scared that you're 0:11:19.880 --> 0:11:22.720 going to find someone with your email signature, when really 0:11:22.800 --> 0:11:25.400 you're doing it in service of being a better emailer 0:11:25.440 --> 0:11:28.520 and not because you're a mean person who hates everybody. No, 0:11:28.720 --> 0:11:30.360 that's true. I should have thought about it that way. 0:11:30.440 --> 0:11:33.480 And also, like, I'm making other people's lives harder right 0:11:33.480 --> 0:11:37.160 now with my emails. So even if I make their 0:11:37.200 --> 0:11:43.440 life momentarily more annoying because they have to read my somebody, Yeah, 0:11:43.480 --> 0:11:45.720 and that's okay, but not as much as I would 0:11:45.800 --> 0:11:49.520 upset somebody by not responding to their true I did 0:11:49.559 --> 0:11:51.880 a little more prep to set myself up for success. 0:11:51.920 --> 0:11:55.400 Once my inbox is clear, I signed emails from important 0:11:55.440 --> 0:11:57.600 people a special color in my inbox, so they showed 0:11:57.679 --> 0:12:00.400 up above the noise, and I saved tem blitz for 0:12:00.440 --> 0:12:03.840 the common emails I send out all the time. Okay, 0:12:03.920 --> 0:12:06.760 now it was time for step two, purging my inbox. 0:12:07.360 --> 0:12:09.280 I had done everything I could think of to slow 0:12:09.320 --> 0:12:12.320 down the barrage of emails I was getting, But now 0:12:12.440 --> 0:12:16.240 I had to tackle my real demon, my ridiculously over 0:12:16.320 --> 0:12:20.360 stuffed inbox. I had a year's worth of unread or 0:12:20.520 --> 0:12:26.840 undealt with or just irrelevant emails, thousands and thousands of them. 0:12:26.880 --> 0:12:29.920 So I did something radical and kind of controversial here, 0:12:30.559 --> 0:12:34.000 something that inbox zero recommends for some people called the 0:12:34.040 --> 0:12:38.320 email d m Z. What is the email d MZ? 0:12:39.080 --> 0:12:41.400 This is where you basically take a bomb to your inbox. 0:12:41.640 --> 0:12:45.559 I decided to wipe every email older than two months, 0:12:45.600 --> 0:12:48.800 just zap it gone. If it was important and I 0:12:48.840 --> 0:12:51.880 didn't respond, it was probably too late. Becca. Do you 0:12:51.880 --> 0:12:53.960 think you could do this? Delete hundreds of emails in 0:12:54.000 --> 0:12:56.440 one shot without even like checking on what they were. Yes, 0:12:56.520 --> 0:12:58.720 I am so on board for this. I've actually wrote 0:12:58.720 --> 0:13:01.040 an article about this one. I wrote an article about 0:13:01.080 --> 0:13:04.080 after you come back from a vacation to delete all 0:13:04.080 --> 0:13:06.839 the emails from before vacation. Just do it. There's no Yeah, 0:13:06.920 --> 0:13:08.600 like you said, if it's important, and I'll come back 0:13:08.640 --> 0:13:10.840 up again. And if you missed it two months ago, 0:13:10.880 --> 0:13:13.680 you've probably missed your window. Yeah. I think there's also 0:13:13.679 --> 0:13:16.920 a nagging fear that there's just something important in there, 0:13:16.920 --> 0:13:18.840 like not necessarily something I needed to respond to, but 0:13:18.960 --> 0:13:23.160 some crucial piece of information that I was going to 0:13:23.200 --> 0:13:25.959 delete and never find again. And I haven't tested whether 0:13:26.000 --> 0:13:29.520 that's actually true, but I suspect we I think we 0:13:29.640 --> 0:13:31.880 think that's true more than it actually is, Like we're 0:13:31.880 --> 0:13:36.000 not storing as much valuable gems of info in our 0:13:36.040 --> 0:13:38.200 email as we think we are. I wouldn't even know 0:13:38.240 --> 0:13:50.680 how to find it. I was ready to lift the 0:13:50.720 --> 0:13:54.080 weight of these thousands of emails off me. It was 0:13:54.160 --> 0:13:56.720 kind of scary, to be honest, just get rid of 0:13:56.760 --> 0:14:00.920 them all in one big select all swoop, you know what. 0:14:00.960 --> 0:14:03.120 I'm just I just gotta do it. This is crazy. 0:14:03.200 --> 0:14:07.760 I have thousands of emails in here, so I'm going 0:14:07.800 --> 0:14:11.319 to expand this window. Oh my god, this is nerve racking. Okay, 0:14:12.000 --> 0:14:16.480 am I really doing this? And I'm just gonna do. 0:14:18.440 --> 0:14:20.120 Oh my god, I have so many emails. I can't 0:14:20.120 --> 0:14:25.080 even understand. Oh I got here, Okay, here we go, 0:14:27.000 --> 0:14:35.840 shift click delete, delete, delete. But I immediately ran into 0:14:35.880 --> 0:14:38.880 a problem. Deleting the emails was not going to be 0:14:39.040 --> 0:14:42.280 a one click deal. Our email system doesn't actually have 0:14:42.360 --> 0:14:45.480 a select all function, so I could only select about 0:14:45.480 --> 0:14:48.200 twenty emails at a time. I was going to have 0:14:48.280 --> 0:14:52.880 to go through these screen by excruciating screen. This would 0:14:52.920 --> 0:15:05.560 take hours. Delete delete, shift click delete. I've been deleting, 0:15:05.960 --> 0:15:10.360 responding to an archiving emails for the last twenty minutes 0:15:10.440 --> 0:15:13.360 and I haven't even gotten past today. So I'm going 0:15:13.400 --> 0:15:16.040 to have to go home and pick it up again 0:15:16.200 --> 0:15:19.960 from home because this has to get done. This is 0:15:20.000 --> 0:15:30.560 a shocking amount of time. While I cleared the backlog, 0:15:30.680 --> 0:15:33.120 I also started in on the emails I had decided 0:15:33.120 --> 0:15:36.800 to save from the past two months, responding to archiving 0:15:36.920 --> 0:15:40.520 or deleting every single one. It took forever. I was 0:15:40.560 --> 0:15:42.760 at the office two hours late and I still wasn't done. 0:15:43.080 --> 0:15:46.520 To be honest, I was getting exhausted. I went home, 0:15:47.000 --> 0:15:49.840 kissed my sleeping kid, and got right back to my laptop. 0:15:50.920 --> 0:15:53.520 At around ten thirty that night, I was finally done, 0:15:53.680 --> 0:15:55.920 which is to say it took me around six hours 0:15:55.960 --> 0:15:58.680 just to delete old emails and respond to her file 0:15:58.800 --> 0:16:00.360 the ones that had come in the past a couple 0:16:00.360 --> 0:16:09.600 of months. I'm finally done. I'm done sorting through emails, 0:16:10.280 --> 0:16:15.280 deleting emails, categorizing emails, responding in to emails, and my 0:16:15.360 --> 0:16:22.680 inbox is empty. I feel tired. That took way way 0:16:22.720 --> 0:16:27.560 longer than I expected, even the deleting part, but I'm 0:16:27.640 --> 0:16:33.000 so glad I did. I feel I feel like more 0:16:33.080 --> 0:16:37.360 competent as a person and a worker and a manager 0:16:38.080 --> 0:16:41.360 just for doing that. It's an amazing way to go 0:16:41.400 --> 0:16:43.760 to bed, which I'm going to do right now because 0:16:43.800 --> 0:16:49.760 I'm really tired. And then my inbox was empty. I 0:16:49.840 --> 0:16:53.200 went to sleep, ready to start my new life as 0:16:53.200 --> 0:16:58.040 an empty inbox person. The question is what would happen 0:16:58.080 --> 0:17:01.760 when new emails started coming in find out after the break. 0:17:18.680 --> 0:17:22.160 The next day, I woke up feeling like a new person. 0:17:27.119 --> 0:17:29.600 I was free from all of those emails that had 0:17:29.600 --> 0:17:32.439 been dragging me down. I had spent the night before 0:17:33.000 --> 0:17:38.119 making sure my inbox was Christine. I walked over to 0:17:38.160 --> 0:17:43.720 my desk, opened up my laptop, and there they were 0:17:45.320 --> 0:17:50.600 dozens of new emails. I already had twenty two new 0:17:50.760 --> 0:17:56.600 pr spam emails alone. This was not going to be easy. 0:17:57.520 --> 0:18:00.320 It was time to solve the next big email problem. 0:18:01.080 --> 0:18:03.760 I had no system for dealing with emails quickly when 0:18:03.760 --> 0:18:07.639 they came in. I was done with steps one and two, 0:18:08.080 --> 0:18:11.560 make rules and purge my inbox. Now I needed to 0:18:11.600 --> 0:18:15.200 start on step three, keep it up. I decided on 0:18:15.240 --> 0:18:17.760 a simplified version of the steps. In Box zero lays 0:18:17.800 --> 0:18:21.760 out scheduling email dashes throughout the day, where you decide 0:18:21.840 --> 0:18:24.439 quickly whether to file, respond to, or delete every email. 0:18:24.960 --> 0:18:27.240 Since my folders would help me decide how quickly to 0:18:27.280 --> 0:18:30.200 respond to things, I'd go through my inbox three times 0:18:30.200 --> 0:18:33.720 a day for twenty minutes, and then check my folders daily, weekly, 0:18:33.760 --> 0:18:37.480 and monthly. My first email dash of the day was 0:18:37.520 --> 0:18:40.080 at ten am, and I had to deal with these 0:18:40.119 --> 0:18:43.560 mailing lists. I think every profession probably has their own 0:18:43.600 --> 0:18:47.080 special spam, and this is the kind journalists get. Becca. 0:18:47.200 --> 0:18:50.080 Let me read you some lines from these emails. I 0:18:50.119 --> 0:18:52.480 know you cover advertising business news, so I wanted to 0:18:52.480 --> 0:18:54.159 send this over to you right away so you have 0:18:54.200 --> 0:18:56.480 the full scoop. I don't cover advertising, and it wasn't 0:18:56.480 --> 0:19:01.359 a scoop? Or February is International Boost Self Esteem Month? 0:19:02.640 --> 0:19:05.080 Or is a nose job? A no note for your kid? 0:19:05.400 --> 0:19:09.480 Parental tips on team plastic surgery. I know you must 0:19:09.480 --> 0:19:11.440 get these two. How do you deal with them? Yeah? 0:19:11.480 --> 0:19:14.040 I think I even got some of those exact same emails. 0:19:14.480 --> 0:19:17.360 How do I deal with them? Ignore? I just let 0:19:17.520 --> 0:19:20.960 them glaze like I let my eyes glance over them 0:19:21.040 --> 0:19:25.120 and decide they're unimportant. It's the same way like when 0:19:25.160 --> 0:19:26.880 you have a mess in your house for long enough, 0:19:26.920 --> 0:19:30.880 you stop seeing it. Yeah. The reality of the situation 0:19:30.920 --> 0:19:34.399 is that itomb is important things, usually not from people 0:19:34.440 --> 0:19:37.080 I know, But I'll get pitched things that I probably 0:19:37.119 --> 0:19:40.280 should cover. But because I have my system involves me 0:19:40.359 --> 0:19:44.840 ignoring most emails, things fall through the trucks. Yeah. The 0:19:44.880 --> 0:19:47.040 worst thing about these types of emails is that sometimes 0:19:47.119 --> 0:19:50.160 even when you unsubscribe, it does nothing. Because I did 0:19:50.200 --> 0:19:52.920 try that at first. I spent about a day going 0:19:52.960 --> 0:19:55.760 and clicking on the little four point font way way 0:19:55.800 --> 0:19:58.359 way at the bottom of every email. But then I 0:19:58.359 --> 0:20:01.560 realized it wasn't working. I kept getting emails from the 0:20:01.640 --> 0:20:05.439 same senders, so I tried something more extreme. Our company 0:20:05.480 --> 0:20:08.479 software lets us block every email from a certain domain, 0:20:08.880 --> 0:20:10.560 so when i'd get an email from a list I 0:20:10.640 --> 0:20:14.000 knew I had already n subscribed from, they got blocked. 0:20:14.840 --> 0:20:17.600 It finally started to work, and the new emails I 0:20:17.680 --> 0:20:23.080 was getting slowed down. I also gingerly started trying to 0:20:23.200 --> 0:20:27.800 train people to send me fewer emails that email signature 0:20:27.840 --> 0:20:30.680 I had added about not sending chains longer than three emails. 0:20:31.040 --> 0:20:34.280 A colleague saw it and called me a hero. And 0:20:34.440 --> 0:20:37.080 one email threat that involved around twenty people and had 0:20:37.119 --> 0:20:40.879 gone on for more than twenty emails, I replied to 0:20:40.920 --> 0:20:43.720 it with a helpful link, explained that I couldn't add 0:20:43.760 --> 0:20:46.879 anything more to the conversation, and asked to be taken 0:20:46.880 --> 0:20:51.640 off the chain, and it worked. Meanwhile, I was responding 0:20:51.680 --> 0:20:55.080 to the relevant emails like a machine. I couldn't stand 0:20:55.240 --> 0:20:59.760 seeing my beautiful, pristine, empty email get cluttered, so when 0:20:59.760 --> 0:21:02.320 more than two or three emails built up, I panic 0:21:02.359 --> 0:21:08.000 and start responding. So I'm looking at around twelve new emails. 0:21:08.720 --> 0:21:15.040 I'm just gonna zip right through them. Okay, I am 0:21:15.080 --> 0:21:20.880 supposed to submit a podcast for an award. Why not 0:21:22.040 --> 0:21:27.200 let's submit, send it done, and I'm going to delete 0:21:28.320 --> 0:21:34.280 delete great, okay, An email to someone who reports to me, 0:21:34.400 --> 0:21:41.840 which I'm copied on, so I'm going to apply to 0:21:42.040 --> 0:21:47.320 that person. So I'm saying, Hi, please do this so 0:21:47.640 --> 0:21:56.680 I don't get any more emails about it. Send delete. 0:21:58.200 --> 0:22:01.880 I was getting really good at sponding and people were noticing. 0:22:02.440 --> 0:22:04.959 Listen to all my haters who were in the studio before, 0:22:05.440 --> 0:22:09.639 eat their words. Have you noticed any changes since I 0:22:09.680 --> 0:22:15.399 started doing endbox zero? I have It's like night and day. Um, 0:22:15.520 --> 0:22:18.040 I would say, now, I you get an email and 0:22:18.040 --> 0:22:20.480 you reply instantly in a way that I would never 0:22:20.560 --> 0:22:23.560 have expected you to do. You are on it like 0:22:23.720 --> 0:22:26.000 I have. There's some stuff where I haven't even gotten 0:22:26.000 --> 0:22:28.520 a chance to like open up the email until I 0:22:28.560 --> 0:22:31.000 see your replies. I feel as that you send out 0:22:31.040 --> 0:22:35.359 more emails now, and when you are a part of 0:22:35.359 --> 0:22:37.600 a group email that I'm also I've also been on, 0:22:38.080 --> 0:22:43.159 you respond with a little more gusto than you have 0:22:43.280 --> 0:22:48.760 in the past, just maybe an exclamation point here there, 0:22:49.440 --> 0:22:54.600 definitely faster within the day a few hours tops. Um, 0:22:54.640 --> 0:23:00.080 I've noticed that you have been replying to emails in 0:23:00.119 --> 0:23:04.520 a more consistent way. I even tested you. I saw 0:23:04.560 --> 0:23:06.040 you were heading to the students to record and I 0:23:06.119 --> 0:23:10.480 send you an email and it took twenty minutes to 0:23:10.640 --> 0:23:13.239 get back to me. So I'm great at email now, 0:23:13.359 --> 0:23:17.320 everybody agrees. But it turned out that there were downsides 0:23:17.359 --> 0:23:20.480 to my new email obsession. I was cheating on my 0:23:20.600 --> 0:23:24.400 dashes instead of sticking to my prescribed three twenty minute 0:23:24.400 --> 0:23:27.680 inbox sessions a day. I was glued to my inbox, 0:23:28.080 --> 0:23:30.480 dealing with emails constantly as they came in. If I 0:23:30.520 --> 0:23:32.760 stepped away from a meeting, I was itching to get 0:23:32.760 --> 0:23:34.879 back to my desk to clean up whatever new litter 0:23:35.000 --> 0:23:37.520 was coming in or worse, I sat in the meeting 0:23:37.520 --> 0:23:40.760 clearing emails on my phone. Keeping my inbox clear had 0:23:40.760 --> 0:23:44.600 become something of an addiction, and my co workers were noticing. 0:23:45.320 --> 0:23:50.480 One thing that's happened is that your zealous emailing has 0:23:50.600 --> 0:23:54.040 kind of been eating its way into the rest of 0:23:54.080 --> 0:23:58.480 your responsibilities on those In a meeting, we were talking 0:23:58.600 --> 0:24:01.040 and someone wanted your attention, and you were all, oh, 0:24:01.080 --> 0:24:04.800 I'm sorry, I just had to answer this email. That's true. 0:24:05.280 --> 0:24:07.760 I was answering an email and I wasn't listening to 0:24:07.840 --> 0:24:10.240 what she was saying in the meeting. He was right, 0:24:10.640 --> 0:24:14.000 I was getting distracted in meetings by my email and 0:24:14.080 --> 0:24:17.280 that's because by the end of the week, I had 0:24:17.320 --> 0:24:22.439 become an inbox zero person. I was totally transformed. That 0:24:22.640 --> 0:24:26.399 email flake my colleagues had been complaining about she was gone. 0:24:27.359 --> 0:24:30.919 I just love the look of that shiny, empty digital space, 0:24:30.960 --> 0:24:34.119 and I became addicted to keeping it that way. I 0:24:34.160 --> 0:24:36.399 confess I even started sneaking in sessions while I was 0:24:36.440 --> 0:24:39.080 at home with my family to do some quick email 0:24:39.160 --> 0:24:52.760 filing and deleting. The new me loves email. You sound 0:24:52.800 --> 0:24:56.160 like you really went through a transformation to someone who 0:24:56.160 --> 0:24:59.440 avoided emails to someone who was addicted to emails. Would 0:24:59.480 --> 0:25:03.520 you call all the experiment a success? Though, Yeah, I would. 0:25:03.680 --> 0:25:05.560 I did what I set out to do. I wiped 0:25:05.600 --> 0:25:08.560 my inbox constantly, and I never left the office with 0:25:08.600 --> 0:25:12.639 an unaddressed email. Would you recommend in box zero to 0:25:12.720 --> 0:25:18.320 other hopeless email cases like yourself. I can't unreservedly recommend it. 0:25:18.320 --> 0:25:20.520 It's true that being on top of your email workload 0:25:20.640 --> 0:25:24.000 feels great, and honestly, before I took stock of how 0:25:24.040 --> 0:25:25.959 bad my email habits where I didn't realize how much 0:25:25.960 --> 0:25:28.360 it was making other people's lives harder. That I wasn't 0:25:28.359 --> 0:25:32.200 being responsive. But there was no way I could stay 0:25:32.200 --> 0:25:34.440 on top of my emails without looking at my inbox 0:25:34.560 --> 0:25:37.560 virtually all the time, and that took time away from 0:25:37.600 --> 0:25:39.719 doing my real job, which it turns out is not 0:25:40.040 --> 0:25:44.240 professional email checker. With so many emails coming in, keeping 0:25:44.240 --> 0:25:47.720 your inbox empty is an uphill battle. And it did 0:25:47.760 --> 0:25:50.239 help to set lots of filters and block emails and 0:25:50.320 --> 0:25:52.320 keep some of that stuff from ever making it to 0:25:52.359 --> 0:25:56.240