Quick and Easy Efficiency Tips for Managing Business Email and Paper
The following time management short cuts will help you manage your time efficiently, get ahead of your workload and start fresh when new work comes your way.
Full Email In-box
There is nothing more overwhelming than a full email in-box and more arriving every minute. Try this simple technique at the end of a work day that should take about 30 minutes to an hour, depending on how many emails you have in your in-box.
Action Email Folder
Start by setting a timer for 10 minutes to quickly find emails you know you need your attention as they contain actionable items. Create a sub-folder within your in-box folder named Action and move emails that need your attention into this folder. If you are not sure how to create a sub-folder, check your help menu, technical support person or ask someone in your office to show you how.
Older Email Folder
Sort the remaining emails by date and file any emails older than two months old to an in-box sub-folder named Older than [insert current date]. For most people, very few emails that are older than a month or two still require your attention.
Sort Email Folder
For the last two months of emails still in your in-box, create a Sort folder and block and move all remaining emails into this folder.
When a new email arrives in your inbox, respond to it immediately and file it in another sub-folder namedComplete or file it in your Action folder if it requires more of your attention that you can give to it upon reading it.
Emails in your Action folder and dealing with new emails as they come in are your top priority. When you have more time, you can sort your Action emails into high, medium and low priority by marking them with coloured flags (red for high, orange for medium and yellow for low priority).
Three Goals for Managing Business Email
- Keep on top of each day’s emails. Don’t leave the office until the day’s emails are either acted on and filed in the complete folder or moved to the action folder.
- Work on your high priority action emails first, then medium, then low priority.
- Read at least 10-15 of the emails in your “Sort" folder each day and either act on them and file them in your Complete folder or file them in your action folder until your Sort folder is empty.
Desk Covered in Piles of Paper
If you can’t see your desk for the papers, it is time to do a quick sort.
Steps to Sorting Business Papers
- Start by getting three boxes and one file folder or plastic envelope.
- Label the boxes: Action, File, Recycle.
- Label the file folder or plastic envelope “Important Papers” and put it in your box labeled File.
- Set a timer for 10 minutes. Take a stack of papers and quickly sort them into one of the three boxes. Put any important papers that are for reference only (i.e. that do not need to be acted on) into the important papers file within your file box.
- Repeat setting the timer until all of your papers are sorted into the three boxes. The idea is to sort quickly so don’t get distracted and act on things you find, simply put them into your Action box. Try to keep the sorting time to under an hour. Most desks can be cleared in 20 minutes.
Your Action box is your highest priority. The next step will be to sort the business papers into high, medium and low priority. You can use three folders – red for high priority, orange for medium and yellow for low.
One day when you have a meeting cancellation or other unexpected free time, use it to file the papers in your File box.
