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Home » Computers And Internet Articles » 5 Top Tips For Managing Your Emails

5 Top Tips for Managing Your Emails

Technology is a wonderful thing - it allows us to work virtually, from anywhere in the world, and makes our lives easier. However, it can also hinder us, and this is particularly true in the case of emails.

Every day we are bombarded with hundreds of emails, only a small percentage of which are necessary. Spam filters are great at filtering most of the unwanted emails but a small amount do get through, adding to the number we have to sift through!

We can spend hours each day checking, sorting, and reading our emails only to find we haven't the time left for actual work! Here are my top 5 tips for managing your emails and giving you back your much-needed time.

1. Emails aren't urgent! Don't feel you have to read an act upon your email the second it hits your inbox. You don't! It isn't urgent. If there was a real emergency then your client/colleague/friend would call you.

2. Are all those newsletters you subscribe to really necessary? Probably not! If this the case spend some time going through them and unsubscribing the ones you don't really want or read.

3. Does your email play distracting alerts, i.e. a sound? If so, disable it. This is a distraction and you could quite easily stop what you're working on to go and check your emails. It will then take you some time to get back on track again, not to mention the amount of time you've just lost stopping what you were doing, reading your emails, and actioning them.

4. Schedule set times to check your emails. Once or twice a day is enough, say first thing in the morning and again later in the day. If you subscribe to various industry groups save reading these emails until you take a break from your work - maybe at the end of the day when you're winding down. You can easily get sidetracked reading all the different topics and replying to them, all of which is taking you away from your paid work.

5. Utlise email filtering tools. Set up folders and filters so that your email gets sent to the appropriate folder as soon as it arrives. Don't know how to do this? Read my article Is Your Inbox Getting You Down? How to Avoid Inbox Overwhelm available on my website.

If you follow these 5 tips above, you will find you are spending less time worrying about and checking your emails, and more time on being productive! That has got to be better for your bottom line.

And here is another random article you might be interested in...

We Are Exactly Where We Choose to Be

The idea for this month's newsletter came from an unlikely encounter: I recently had lunch with a new friend named Rick Rockwell. You may remember him as the bachelor from the first-ever reality TV show, "Who Wants to Marry a Multimillionaire?"

During our meeting, Rick described some of the knowledge he gained from doing the show, along with a few of past his experiences in business, ethics, and of course, primetime romance. The stories were fantastic, the drama was riveting, and as Rick detailed his adventures with great humor, what impressed me most was what he wasn't saying.

You see, at no time did he dwell on the misfortune of not finding the love of his life or the way the media portrayed him. Instead, he said something along the lines of, "You know, Greg,! short and simply put, our circumstances, good or bad, are a direct result of our own actions, and ultimately, the only thing in which we are in true control of is our own (Attitude) towards them."

To which I agreed and responded, "You're absolutely right. We're are all dealt obstacles as well as good fortune in our lives-that's simply a part of life itself. Yet it's how we handle the obstacles that shows the world our true character as a person."

Rick and I sat there, just reflecting on the impact of that message for a bit until the idea of this newsletter popped into my head. I said, "You know, Rick, when it's all said and done, the bottom line is . . .

"We are exactly where we choose to be."

Now, this is where I put the question to you, the reader: Isn't that true for all of us? Isn't that true for all those around us?

I'm sure you know people (or perhaps even yourself at times) who blame the world for their setbacks and failures, then simply! credit "luck" for those who succeed around them. Yet, when we really examine our own lives, we see that we are exactly where we choose to be at any given moment.

>We are a product of our own environment because we are the ones creating the environment we are in.<

Have you ever noticed people taking negative actions like hanging out at the local dive bar every day after work, spending all their money on liquor and fun, and then complaining that they're broke and can never catch a "break"? Have you ever noticed people who confide to their family and friends that they can't find love, yet they never leave the house or put themselves in situations (or on TV) to meet new people? But haven't you also noticed people who surround themselves with positive influences, work hard, are accountable, plan for the future, and "create" their own breaks?

In my new friend's case, he was and is simply seeking love. What he got, however, was something completely different (! he was slandered in the press). While he admits that he put himself in that situation to begin with, he thrives on the fact that he took such a bold chance before anyone else did in history. Would he change the way it turned out if he had the power to do so? Of course. But he wouldn't change the opportunity itself because he was the one who put himself there in the first place...the bottom line, he took a chance and stood by the outcome.

The moral of this story (or newsletter, in this case) is presented in the form of a challenge. Sit down and ask yourself this question: "What is right, and what do you wish to be different in your life?"

You might want to take a minute or two to make a list. Take accountability for all those things, both the good and the bad; for after all, you created them. Then simply keep doing the things that are right, and work on a strategy to create new (positive) actions to stop doing the things that are not.

It would be complete insa! nity to continue punching yourself in the face and then complain to the world that you always have a black eye...now wouldn't it?

As you work on your list, keep this mind: You are handed two major tools in life-a hammer for building and a shovel for digging. If you ever find yourself digging a hole deeper and deeper and wishing you could get out of it, just stop digging! Because, when it's all said and done . . .

We are exactly where we choose to be.

Keep Smilin'

You have permission to publish this article electronically or in print, free of charge, as long as the bylines are included. A courtesy copy of your publication would be appreciated - send to: GregReid@AlwaysGood.com