I have a real problem with drawers. My kitchen drawer looks like a stationery shop collided with a cutlery factory. I have drawers stacked so full of odds and ends that opening or shutting them becomes a task that needs real planning. If I need anything, I know exactly where it is though – in a drawer. Which drawer, I have no idea, and even if I get the right one, locating a needed object is more like an archaeological dig than anything else. Does this sound familiar to you?
We all have junk boxes or dump drawers, where anything and everything gets heaped up together. The strange thing is, we’re all perfectly content with this because we know, in our heart of hearts, that when we get a chance we will be thoroughly sorting that drawer out, and that will be a good day. We will feel good. Except that, for some reason, that day never seems to be today.
Unfortunately, this same level of procrastinated organization tends to filter through to other aspects of our lives, such as email. Does your inbox look like my cutlery drawer? Old rubbish you should have thrown away a long time ago jostling for space alongside really important items? If so, you may be suffering from email overload, and feel the tension building as your subconscious guilt admits that the whole idea of having an organized inbox is nothing more than a pipe dream. You always meant to create the ultimate filing system, but somehow, that day was never today.
The problem lies in considering where to start. You almost certainly have out of date emails that can be deleted, but to find them you need to work your way through scores of messages, many of which need saving. But where do you put them?
An organized inbox should only ever be used, if indeed at all, for new messages. Once a message has been read, it should either be deleted, or if it is necessary to save it, moved to a suitable folder, or subfolder. The sense in this is fairly obvious – you will know where to find information when you need it, just like being able to find the potato peeler beneath the pencils, or a pen that actually works.
The first stage is to actually create a folder structure. Even if the folders are empty, it gives you a starting point. A quick way of beginning the process of sorting your inbox out is to sort all your emails by sender name or email address. In Outlook this is fairly easy. Simply click on the title bar at the top of your email list, probably labelled ‘Sender’ or ‘From’. You can now see at a glance all of the emails from your Great Aunt Gertrude. These can be lovingly transferred in one block to your ‘Aunty G’ folder. The block of emails from the Boss can be transferred to your work folder, and so on.
To keep on top of this system, try using a tool like MoveIT – it’s an add-on for Outlook which will help you to identify patterns and rules with the emails you receive, and work alongside your folder structure. This means that, unlike Outlook rules which will file your incoming mail into different folders before you get to see them, you get a chance to see the new emails as they come in, but then with just one single click of the mouse, all your selected emails will be magically moved into suitable folders based on rules you define. This will dramatically increase the speed with which you can find them next time. MoveIT makes the process of creating rules simple and intuitive.
It might not help you find the right sized screwdriver in your cutlery drawer, but it will save you a great deal of wasted time searching for actionable emails in your inbox.
