Comments on: What’s Your Email Style — Plain or Fancy?

By: Web Worker Daily » Archive Top Time-wasters for Web Workers (And How to Cure Them) «

Fri, 16 May 2008 18:15:24 +0000

[...] Personally, I’ve used Inbox Zero with great success, while other people made progress with fancier email styles. There’s also the newly coined Inbox Infinity. Pre-existing email productivity systems might [...]

By: Matthew Cornell

Matthew Cornell — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 14:56:28 +0000

Hmmm – we’re mixing a few dimensions here, I think. One is *message* complexity/style: Do you write short, crisp ones, or longer, prose-style ones? (Guess what: The days of the latter are *very* over. Instead, write a short email summary, call for specific action, and attach the doc or point to it on a server, better yet.)

The second dimension is complexity/style in *managing* your email. Spectrum: Bill Clinton – Tim Ferriss – me and you :-) The issue is who does the thinking – us or someone else? Someone else is great, if you can a) get away with it, or b) set it up.

Related to the left side of the spectrum, those folks can also get away with not keeping a schedule. This is the “Arnold Swarchenegger self-management approach” (sit outside his office and wait – the burden is on *us* to get his attention).

This works for high-fliers who can dictate such a policy, but not for most of us.

By: Steve

Steve — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 12:42:36 +0000

Similar to Peter, but I also use Gmails “star” tool to highlight the emails in my inbox that I need to follow up on. Then I clear my inbox a couple of times a week.

I also use a few Gmail labels to archive things like site registrations under a certain category.

By: Brent Hopkins

Brent Hopkins — Sun, 27 Jan 2008 02:53:06 +0000

Intermediate. I use Gmail with a lot of filters and labels, plus I use Remember The Milk. Once things are labeled or tasked, I archive them. I color-code my labels too in order to make them stand out visually. I harldly ever open Outlook (Windows) or Evolution (Linux); I just use them occasionally for backup purposes.

By: Peter

Peter — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 02:59:51 +0000

Plain. Messages that I have read and/or acted upon are archived or deleted. Messages that I need to act on but can’t are kept in the Inbox as a reminder to do them. Messages that ask me to do something that I need more information from somone else are forwarded on to the other person asking for that info and then archived or deleted. When they send back the info I need the new email acts as a reminder.
This policy means I ususally have 10-20 messages in my Inbox.

By: drewpreston

drewpreston — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 22:45:24 +0000

I try to only check my email 3 times a day. The important ones make it into my task management system. Maybe one day I’ll hire that virtual assistant when I sell that first company :-)

By: David

David — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 21:18:19 +0000

Plain text ;) Using mutt as email reader helped me saving a great amount of time.

By: Lifehacker » Blog Archive » What’s Your Email Style - Plain or Fancy?

Thu, 24 Jan 2008 19:40:24 +0000

[...] Read the rest of this great post here [...]

By: theo

theo — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 17:09:28 +0000

somewhere in the middle. I probably lean towards fancy. I use lots of rules in outlook, and nowadays XOBNI! Yaaay xobni.

By: nhickmarin

nhickmarin — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 16:25:08 +0000

Plain, I don’t really delete messages that often.. might need it later.

nhick
http://www.itrush.com