WEBVTT - How to Spend Less Time on Email

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<v Speaker 1>Good morning. This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.

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<v Speaker 1>Today's tip is about how to spend less time on email.

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<v Speaker 1>Email is an incredibly useful tool. I started my career

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<v Speaker 1>working as a journalist, and I learned to report before

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<v Speaker 1>a lot of people had access to email. It was

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<v Speaker 1>a very different experience. Trying to get people on the

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<v Speaker 1>phone was often tough. Sources would call you back while

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<v Speaker 1>you were on the phone with someone else, so there's

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<v Speaker 1>a lot of phone tag and since you often had

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<v Speaker 1>to go through gatekeepers to get people on the phone,

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<v Speaker 1>it was tempting to keep calling the same people you

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<v Speaker 1>knew would talk with you. Email has opened this all up.

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<v Speaker 1>Everyone is more accessible. This is awesome in some ways,

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<v Speaker 1>and it's also a problem in some other ways. Accessibility

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<v Speaker 1>means anyone can email anyone anywhere in the world at

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<v Speaker 1>any time, and so we do. I don't have to

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<v Speaker 1>tell you that email overload is the cause of an

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<v Speaker 1>incredible amount of workplace stress. People feel constantly behind. In

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<v Speaker 1>My time management fable Juliette School of Possibilities, In one scene,

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<v Speaker 1>Riley notes that the number of unread messages in her

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<v Speaker 1>inbox appears to be rising like seconds on a stop watch.

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<v Speaker 1>People have told me that reading that scene has made

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<v Speaker 1>them feel incredibly anxious. So I wanted to share a

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<v Speaker 1>strategy that one before Breakfast listener wrote in to tell

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<v Speaker 1>me was working for her. She's a project management consultant

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<v Speaker 1>working for global clients. That means that I can receive

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<v Speaker 1>emails at all hours of the day. She writes, I

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<v Speaker 1>often wake up in the morning to a full day's

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<v Speaker 1>worth of emails from Asia and a good chunk from

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<v Speaker 1>Europe as well. Usually by the time I get through

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<v Speaker 1>my responses, the American emails are starting to roll in,

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<v Speaker 1>with Eastern time emails through my work day and Pacific

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<v Speaker 1>time emails after I've left the office. When I first

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<v Speaker 1>took on this position, she writes, I'd be answering emails

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<v Speaker 1>at five am, nine am to five pm, and then

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<v Speaker 1>late into my evening. This not only led to burn out,

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<v Speaker 1>but also my responses were less detailed than they should be,

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<v Speaker 1>and I was being distracted from my other tasks and

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<v Speaker 1>my personal life. So she writes, she discovered email BATCHNG.

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<v Speaker 1>Here's what she did. I turned off email notifications entirely

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<v Speaker 1>and set two one hour long blocks into my calendar.

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<v Speaker 1>One in the early morning for Asia and Europe, and

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<v Speaker 1>one in the afternoon for the Americas. I then stopped

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<v Speaker 1>responding to any emails not labeled urgent outside of this time.

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<v Speaker 1>So now, if you're listening to this, you may be

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<v Speaker 1>wondering if all our listeners clients got angry and decided

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<v Speaker 1>to find other consultants who had respond instantly. The answer

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<v Speaker 1>is no. It was amazing how quickly, without saying anything,

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<v Speaker 1>clients responded to the shift, she writes. If anything urgent

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<v Speaker 1>came up, they used their phones, which is something we

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<v Speaker 1>too often avoid. It allowed me to stay on task

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<v Speaker 1>during the rest of my work day, well also giving

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<v Speaker 1>thoughtful responses to emails during my designated time blocks. Sometimes

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<v Speaker 1>I need more than an hour, she writes, and sometimes

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<v Speaker 1>I need less, but setting the time in advance allows

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<v Speaker 1>me to be more productive. I can be productive not

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<v Speaker 1>just with email time, but all my time. She calls

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<v Speaker 1>this a significant win. I agree. What this consultant realized

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<v Speaker 1>is that, yes, clients want her to be responsive, but

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<v Speaker 1>the reason they're emailing her is that they think she

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<v Speaker 1>has great ideas. They think she can come up with

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<v Speaker 1>genius solutions to their problems. If she's constantly on email

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<v Speaker 1>and constantly moving back and forth between email and other things.

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<v Speaker 1>She can't do that, plus her responses are going to

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<v Speaker 1>be less well thought through than they might be. The

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<v Speaker 1>hard truth here is that sometimes you need to disappoint

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<v Speaker 1>someone's immediate expectation, such as that they will receive an

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<v Speaker 1>immediate response, in order to meet the bigger expectation, which

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<v Speaker 1>is an actual solution to their challenges. So i'd encourage

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<v Speaker 1>you to try back your email responses now. Don't worry.

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<v Speaker 1>I'm not one of those people who says you should

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<v Speaker 1>never check email in the morning or only once per day.

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<v Speaker 1>For most people, that's really just not workable. You'll notice

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<v Speaker 1>that our project management consultant said she would answer stuff

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<v Speaker 1>marked urgent, and if she's doing that, that means she's

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<v Speaker 1>looking at her inbox more frequently than twice a day.

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<v Speaker 1>It makes sense if someone emails you that your one

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<v Speaker 1>thirty meeting is canceled, you'd probably like to know that.

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<v Speaker 1>If you're not getting a whole lot of email from

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<v Speaker 1>overseas so you don't need to make sure you respond

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<v Speaker 1>before the end of another continent's work day, then maybe

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<v Speaker 1>your response blocks can be at different times, say ten

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<v Speaker 1>thirty to eleven thirty in the morning rather than really

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<v Speaker 1>early like six or seven am, and then three thirty

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<v Speaker 1>to four thirty in the afternoon to get the stuff

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<v Speaker 1>from the day. But setting two blocks of time to

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<v Speaker 1>respond to emails and then maybe two other times to

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<v Speaker 1>quickly check in for urgent questions means that you're never

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<v Speaker 1>more than about two hours from seeing someone's email at

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<v Speaker 1>least during your work day, and that's pretty good. It

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<v Speaker 1>also guarantees that you're spending about two and a half

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<v Speaker 1>hours per work day on email, instead of feeling like

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<v Speaker 1>you're spending ten hours a day on email. You could

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<v Speaker 1>possibly even work fewer hours and make more progress on

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<v Speaker 1>your big projects if you're not in your inbox all

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<v Speaker 1>the time. And hey, I am all in favor of

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<v Speaker 1>anything that helps people feel less busy while getting more done.

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<v Speaker 1>So think about your schedule and whether you could schedule

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<v Speaker 1>to email response blocks and maybe a few more scheduled

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<v Speaker 1>quick checks during the day. If you try it, let

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<v Speaker 1>me know. And thanks to our project management consultant for

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<v Speaker 1>sending in her schedule strategy. I love to hear from listeners,

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<v Speaker 1>so if you have a question or a tip, please

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<v Speaker 1>let me know. You can email me at before breakfast

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<v Speaker 1>podcast at iHeart media dot com. I'll probably be responding,

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<v Speaker 1>but not more than twice a day. In the meantime,

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<v Speaker 1>this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's to making

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<v Speaker 1>the most of our time.