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The topic of well-being and email overload has featured several times over the past month. Some are arguing for old fashioned mobile phones which act solely as a phone. Whether or not this will solve the problems of email overload and digital addiction is debatable. Perhaps it is more about educating ourselves to use our smart devices smartly.
Then there is the thorny questions of whether or not it is wise to include emojis (eg smiley faces) in emails and how long before social media takes over from email. Last but by no means least 90% of us are scammed by email every month. Read on for our top five articles of note during August.
1.Taking control of your inbox in a healthy way.
Julia Schmidt PA to the Chief Executive of Basfarm a Norwegian IT service provider and undertaking a study of well-being in the workplace. As part of this she interviewed Monica. Click here for the interview and her top tips on the subject.
2. Has the smart phone destroyed a generation?
The average person checks their smart phone every six minutes according to Nancy Colier. Recent research from the USA (Professor Jean Twenge) argues that the smartphone is destroying a complete generation. They are more comfortable with technology than people than any previous generation, many are on the brink of a nervous break down.
A must read for anyone with an interest in the impact of smart phones on Millenials.
What’s your take?
3.Email still dominates work and personal communications. So you thought email might disappear soon? Think again according to the latest research from Adobe. Whilst face-to-face communications are starting to rise, emails continues to dominate with over social media. Their survey found that people are spending slightly less time checking email than a year ago. Interesting 62% prefer to check their emails on a desktop. Only half ever achieve inbox-zero and as we’ve discussed before it is questionable if this a productive exercise. Meanwhile 43% still check emails in the bathroom. And this from a company with a vested interest in social media! Makes me think we are still very much addicted to our smartphones and email and that there are few real business alternatives to email.
4.The dark side of a smiley. A new global study reveals that far from creating a warm friendly email, an emoji (emoticon) make you look less competent. We have been against their inclusion for years so this just back-up our previous opinion and findings. A thought worth keeping in mind for those who run induction courses for new graduate joiners. Keep all the emoji (smiley faces etc) for social emails only.
5.Nine in ten hit by email scams every month. Considering how much is written about reducing the risk over identity theft and cyber crime this is a very demoralising figure. Does no one read and take note? PayPal, Banks and HMRC are the top three bogus emails sent and it is often younger people who are worst hit. What does this say about their addiction to smartphone? Click here for our top tips on avoiding such scams.
Is email addiction, email overload, email etiquette effecting the performance and well-being of your workforce? Call or email us now to discuss how our email best practice workshops and consultancy service can help you.
Tags: alternatives to email, Business email management, cyber crime, Email Scams, Jean Twenge, Julia Schmidt, Milleniels, Take Control of Your Inbox
If you didn’t action an email, whose fault is it? Probably the sender because they put your name in the wrong email address line. This is part of a series of videos on Business Email Etiquette and Management from Mesmo Consultancy.
It focuses on:
This is part of a series on smart business email management and etiquette. It is one of the topics we cover in Mesmo Consultancy’s Smart Email Management Masterclasses. Contact us now for more information.
This is an Ellie Styles production. See https://ellie-stiles.myportfolio.com/
Tags: bcc, business email etiquette, Business email management, Mesmo Consultancy, Reply All, To versus Cc
Whosoever desires constant success must change his conduct with the times. Niccolo Machiavelli
Email overload is stressful and can also be an underlying cause of mental health issues. Hopefully you have reduced the email overload, have a clean inbox and improved your productivity and well-being.
Now the trick is to keep your inbox under control and encourage others to follow suit.
Email addiction is one of the major causes of email overload. It’s the feeling that you must constantly check your inbox no matter where you are, what you are doing or what the time of day. Moreover, we often default to email when of course there are a myriad of other ways to communicate. As many of you will know I am a great fan of pen and paper especially for saying thank you and taking ownership when being asked to do something rather than retorting with ‘send me an email’.
Day five is about taking stock, checking you are not suffering from email addiction and making plans to keep your inbox out of the email overload zone. Here is our three step plan for the last day.
Use Mesmo Consultancy’s free Email Addiction self-assessment tool. Identify your strengths and weaknesses and if necessary seek advice about how to control the urge to have another email fix.
In the coming days and weeks as you are about either to Reply/Forward or even ‘Send’ pause and ask yourself would an alternative be more efficient (eg talking, a discussion group on something like SharePoint, instant message etc)?
Look back to Day 1 and how much time you were losing. Now re-calibrate using our Cost of Email Misuse Calculator. Where do you still need to make some changes?
How will you keep your inbox slim and control the business email overload in the coming weeks? Don’t let email rule your day. Don’t feel you must check your email either first thing in the morning or every five minutes. Rather try disconnect from time to time. The most productive people are those who prioritise their time and stay focused on the task in hand.
Do you have colleagues who would benefit from managing their email more effectively as you have now done? Yes, then call us now to ask about our Brilliant Email Management master classes. Otherwise how about giving them a copy of either ‘Brilliant Email’ or ‘Taking Control of Your Inbox’?
Share your progress; Email; Facebook: Twitter (using #MentalHealthAwarenessWeek) There are two prize for the two people who have made the most outstanding progress (a copy of ‘Brilliant Email‘ and ‘Taking Control of Your Inbox”). For instance, had five days of empty inboxes, reduced the number of rounds of email ping-pong by improving their email etiquette etc.
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Thank you for joining us for this the re-run of Clean Out Your Inbox Week to support Mental Health Awareness week We hope we have made a small contribution to helping people re-focus their work-life balance and de-stress.. Feedback on how we can improve this event for next year is always appreciated.
Tags: Business email management, Business email overload, email addiction, Mental Health Awareness Week, well being
Develop an uncanny ability to be selectively ignorant. Timothy Ferriss.
Managing stress is about managing what is under your control. The same is true about reducing the time you spend (and waste dealing with email). To save time and reduce the email stress, you need to reduce the number of emails you receive each day. Deleting simply is not an option. You have be proactive and keep all unwanted emails out of your inbox and reduce the number of times you check for new email. here is our three stage business email management strategy to do so.
How many of the emails you receive do you really need? Triage your emails as you deal with them. Ask yourself ‘Do I really need this email?’ ‘How useful is this to me?’ For more guidance on prioritising see Brilliant Email chapter 3 and ‘Taking Control of Your Inbox’ if you are a PA or EA.
For all those low priority emails, either get yourself off the sender’s list or automatically move them out of your inbox so they don’t distract you from the really important ones. Your inbox should be your ‘work in hand’ just like an old fashioned in-tray. Ways to reduce the incoming email traffic and hence email overload are:
Click here to see how to write rules that allow you see only the important emails (and not waste time on email distractions dealing with the lower priority ones).
How often do you currently check for new emails? When was the last time you received an email which would mean a catastrophe if you did not respond for about an hour? Give yourself a break from the inbox to allow yourself to focus on the task in-hand for at least 30 minutes and preferably one hour. Try not deal with your email too late into the night as that can seriously effect your quality of sleep and your work-life balance.
Don’t forget there are lots more tips and advice like this on ‘Brilliant Email’ and ‘Taking Control of Your Inbox’ a book written especially for PAs and EAs. 
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Do you feel others colleagues would benefit from help cleaning out their inboxes? Why not either join them up to this week’s programme or ask MesmoConsultancy to run one of our Brilliant Email Management master classes?
Tags: Business email management, Business email overload, Mental Health Awareness Week, well being
Every sent an email and ping the reply is ‘where is the attachment’? Ever had the message ‘mailbox full’? Both waste time and can be stressful. This video, enables you to save time dealing with attachments as a sender and recipient. It is the 5th in the Business Email Management series from Mesmo Consultancy.
It will show you how to:
If you like this video, don’t forget is it is one of a series on smart business email management and etiquette. It is also one of the topics we cover in Mesmo Consultancy’s Smart Email Management Masterclasses. Contact us now for more information.
Tags: Attachement best practice, Attachment management, business email etiquette, Business email management, Mesmo Consultancy, Smart Email Management, Take Control of Your Inbox