Many people think that by being busy they are also being productive. For email, you have to carefully evaluate what you are doing. Work email is something that we are usually forced to read (at least to some degree), for everything else, it is a matter of choice. Choose to start you day on the right foot, when you come into the office in the morning, just do a quick check on your email for any true can’t wait items, so you don’t miss critical meeting requests, and so forth, but do not get sucked into email that isn’t absolutely critical. Consider Taking the first two hours of the day as heads-down working time, there is plenty of time to answer those email messages later, beside that, I’ve found that many of those types of messages get resolved without you.

 Be Selective in Firing Your Weapon, or It Might Just Boomerang

You can also often save time by not responding right away, most people don’t mind you not answering right away especially if they know you have major projects and are a busy person. If you are called on it, try to excuse yourself by saying that you have been busy. Another great tip is to be careful who you carbon copy, the more people that you respond to, the greater the chance of the email thread spinning out of control, try to just email the person that sent you the email and then carefully evaluate anyone else you put on the list.

Technorati Tags: email management, managing email, email filters, fight spam, avoid spam, get rid of spam