Bit Literacy - Mark Hurst [12]
If the message is an FYI, scan it, and file it if necessary, but delete it as quickly as you can, so you can move on to the next message.
Use the two-minute rule and complete any quick todos right now. Don’t put these off, even in a long induction process. Depending on how big the inbox is, you might have an hour or more of work on this step, but it’s worth it to take care of these, finally, on your way to an empty inbox.
Bigger action items are easy to handle: just move them to your todo list and move on. Don’t even think of taking on a large todo right now; your goal is to clear these from the inbox and continue your march. You can take stock of your todo list once the inbox is empty.
Although it could take hours, induction will clear every message from a bulging inbox, no matter how big. The inbox will then be ready for a much easier daily cleanout, and users can apply the steady-state method daily, or more than once a day, depending on their preference. They can also choose how often to check e-mail.
How Often to Check, How Often to Empty
Some users prefer to check for new e-mail only once or twice a day. This minimizes the chance of distraction until the user is ready to engage the new messages. Other users prefer to keep their e-mail program constantly checking for e-mail throughout the day. This allows users to engage new e-mails as they appear, so that the inbox count never gets too high.
Bit-literate users should choose whichever method feels right. Different moments may also call for different choices. I usually have my e-mail program doing constant checks, but occasionally when I need to focus on a block of work, I’ll temporarily halt the checks. In no case, though, should users (or companies) make a policy of artificially limiting anyone’s access to incoming e-mail. Bit literacy gives users the freedom to choose when, and how often, to engage the bits.
Similarly, users have two choices for how often to clear the inbox: as e-mails arrive, or once or twice a day. Some users may opt to empty the inbox at the same time each day. In this case, the end of the day is a good time to do it, since that allows users to enjoy the evening and come in the next morning to see, perhaps, just a few new messages in the inbox. Users should make their own choice, as long as they never let the inbox go more than a day without emptying.
Users who are in an all-day meeting, or on a business trip, may find it difficult to empty the inbox at any time during the day. There is no easy solution for this; managing the inbox requires especially hard work when time is short. But there is no other choice. Since messages never stop coming in, the user must constantly stay in the pursuit of an empty inbox. The only alternatives are to let the inbox grow and grow, causing all the problems discussed earlier, or to hold the inbox steady at a certain count.
No Halfway Solutions
The “steady count” approach is a deceptively attractive halfway solution. Some users prefer to keep their inboxes at a modest count—five or ten messages—figuring that it’s “close enough” to an empty inbox. People who do this often tell me that they’re using their inbox as a todo list. Because they’ve let most of the bits go, they’re not distracted by lots of messages; the few left in the inbox are their todos for the day. There are two problems with this approach, though:
It’s not their only todo list. Incoming e-mails are only one source of action items, so these users always maintain some other list—in a notebook, or in a separate todo list program—and as a result they can’t see all their todos in one place. They have to spend time switching from list to list, which drains productivity and makes prioritization difficult. Using a single bit-literate todo list, as described in the next chapter, solves this problem and keeps the inbox empty.
By keeping a steady count, the user never gets the “done” feeling of seeing an empty inbox. In fact, the user is doing the same amount of work as he would to hold the inbox at a constant count