Comments on: Product Manager Secrets For Dealing With Email

By: A Cheap Way To Stay In Touch With Your Customers

A Cheap Way To Stay In Touch With Your Customers — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 04:02:43 +0000

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By: Dr. Jim Anderson

Dr. Jim Anderson — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 14:36:51 +0000

Mike: You caught my attention with the Xobni reference. I had read about it in the Wall Street Journal and so I installed it. It’s pretty cool looking, but it sure seemed to slow my Outlook down. I ended up removing it because the value that it provided was not worth the wait time that I was sitting though. Have you seen the same thing?

By: Aaron Crews

Aaron Crews — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 22:50:38 +0000

Mike – those are great ideas. It is an enlightening realization that search is powerful and quick enough now that you do not have to file every email – you can pile it instead. XP users can get great search functionality using Windows Search 4.0 (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/winfamily/desktopsearch/default.mspx; this is built into Vista). This gives you a search box in your toolbar that will find any file/email on your computer, including those residing in a .pst archive.

I like the concept of using your deleted items as an archive because the keyboard shortcuts (delete, shift-delete) are built-in. Personally, I do mini-piles: one pile per project and an archive pile. I have macros set up to move the selected emails to the appropriate pile. These macros can be initiated via keyboard shortcut: Alt-Q is Archive, and projects are Alt-1, Alt-2, etc. Deleted items get deleted, and sent items are unfiltered.

By: Mike Boudreaux

Mike Boudreaux — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 16:12:38 +0000

I didn’t realize how much I have built into my email use habits until I read your comment. It has just built up as best-practices I’ve picked up here and there over the past decade.

Another Outlook email tip – Try installing Xobni (Inbox spelled backward). It shows a window pane next to your Outlook Inbox with information about the recipient, including links to the conversations you have had and the file attachments exchanged. Very useful!

I autoarchive my sent items and deleted items to a separate PST file that includes these same directories. If the email is older than 1 week, then it goes to my offline folder and I know exactly where it is. Even with this frequency I end up moving messages over manually because I will run out of space in my mailbox. People keep sending me big files via email – a major annoyance of mine.

I forgot to mention that I do have one folder that I file to – Important Emails. I put major emails there, like policy communciations, strategic milestones, etc. I have tried filing emails, but I usually end up searching for the place I filed it more than if I just do a text search. When I’m looking for an older message, I usually know the sender or the recipient and the time frame when it was sent and I’ll just go directly to the name in my sent/deleted items folders. I have found that trying to maintain a filing system usually ends up being a bottleneck in keeping my Inbox clean and I can’t find them when I need them anyway.

I think that the most important email management tool in Outlook is shift-delete. If you don’t need to see it ever again, permanently delete it! If I reply to a message, I will often delete the original one because it is duplicated in the body of my reply.

I also don’t typically keep Bookmarks in my Internet browser either, except for corporate Intranet sites that aren’t searchable by Google. Even if I visit a site regularly, I will go there by searching Google. In general, I hate browsing through files and sites to find things. Two clicks at most and I should be where I’m going.

By: Dr. Jim Anderson

Dr. Jim Anderson — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 15:15:18 +0000

Mike: Wow – you’ve been a busy boy! It sure looks like you’ve almost “programmed” your email system to handle email the way that you want it to be handled. What really caught my attention was that you never file email (it only exists in sent / deleted). I’m not so sure I’m on board with this one. I find myself using Google Desktop to search my email every so often in order to find some important piece of info. I think that a deleted folder gets cleaned out every so often and that would screw me up big time! I’ll need to look into that Franklin Covey tool…

By: Mike Boudreaux

Mike Boudreaux — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 18:47:14 +0000

Lots of great suggestions. I use these methods to manage my Inbox:
1 – I have a CC: Inbox where all messages go if I’m not in the To: line.
2 – I use rules to move newsletters emails to a separate folder. I rarely look at these unless I have a lot of downtime. I read RSS for news feeds.
3 – I use auto-formatting to mark emails from my upward reports red so I make sure to respond to these promptly.
4 – I delete messages immediately if they don’t require action by me. Deleted items are autoarchived to a PST for searching.
5 – I drag emails that require action to my Task list and delete the message.
6 – I shift-delete replies like “OK” and “good job” and “great idea.”
7 – I shift-delete messages that I reply to and try to only keep the final message in a discussion in my Deleted Items folder.
8 – I never file emails. They are either in Sent items or Deleted items folders.

The CC: Inbox rule is probably the most important one. If I’m on the Cc: list I assume that it is for information only. I usually read these only once/week.

I recently installed Franklin Covey PlanPlus in Outlook and it helps me to prioritize tasks and group them into projects. I’ve used this tool before and I think it is really helpful to prioritize my work. A long time ago I used paper planners from Franklin Covey and so their tools make sense to me.

By: Dr. Jim Anderson

Dr. Jim Anderson — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 02:23:56 +0000

Jeff: you know, I had forgotten about that part of David’s plan. I can remember that I was always trying to schedule time to do a daily review in order to stay on top of things; however, something always seemed to come up. Eventually my @Actions folder and @Waiting For folders would grow to monstrous size and I’d be right back where I started.

I’m impressed that you’ve been able to make this work for you. Perhaps I need to go back and give it one more try…

By: Jeff

Jeff — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 02:50:34 +0000

There is one point in David Allen’s book that is crucial to the process: the weekly review. In Outlook, I added a weekly reminder to go through my inbox and clean everything up. I also use this time to go through all my tasks in my @actions folder and delete/archive what no longer needs to be in my @waiting for folder. This keeps things neat and tidy and allows me to be on top of things.

By: Dr. Jim Anderson

Dr. Jim Anderson — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 14:57:53 +0000

Raghavendra: Well there you go – you sure seem to have found a way to use your email inbox as a powerful task tracking tool. I like that you are using color coding to identify the most important emails – I set that up awhile ago; however, I used too many different colors and now I can’t remember which is which!

What I would miss if I used your system is that deep down feeling of satisfaction that I get when I see that my inbox is actually empty! My system of moving emails to other files, even through there is really only one, has the danger that I’ll forget to check on those emails that I moved.

I like your system! Now just make sure that you back up ALL of your email files often…!

By: Raghavendra

Raghavendra — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 18:50:12 +0000

Dr. Jim Anderson: Yes, as you said Inbox gets filled fast. I get 150 to 200 mails everyday. As I mentioned in my earlier comment, there are only three actions that I take for new mail. Delete it, move it to project folder or keep it in Inbox. At the end of the day I make sure that my Inbox doesn’t have more than 20 mails(tasks). I don’t use any other task list and reminders. Mail count in my mail box reminds me of my tasks.
I also use rules and formatting features in Microsoft Outlook. Some examples given below.
– I get mails sent to a mailing list with known subject, majority of these mails don’t need any action from me. As many people do I have created rules to delete/move these mails.
– I use auto-formatting settings for my mails in Inbox. All mails sent directly to me will be in red color. Mails due to subscription with a web site/service provider will be in green color. Mails that I send to myself for follow-ups will be in light grey color. So whenever I open my Inbox I will easily know which mails to check first.
– I have tweaked layout of window, tool bars and menu items of Outlook such that I get to see as many mails as possible with auto preview option.