Learn to conquer e-mail overload

There’s nothing that kills that post-vacation glow faster than returning home to
an overstuffed e-mail box. If you’re sitting on the beach right now cringing at
the thought of opening your e-mail when you return, here are some tips to help you
tame this beast:

Plan ahead

By Michelle Johnson- Boston Globe

OK. It’s probably too late
for that. But if you haven’t
left town yet, there are a
couple of things you
should do now to ease
e-mail overload. First,
clear out the dead wood.
Delete all those old
messages to keep the
vacation deluge from
piling up on top of what
you left behind.

Second, set up filters. Most e-mail programs have a feature that will automatically
route incoming mail into folders for you. That’ll make it easier to spot the important
stuff. For example, create a folder that’ll snag anything sent out by your boss. Or
use filters to separate personal and business mail.

Don’t know how to set up mail filters? Start by checking your e-mail program’s
help file. If that’s no help (true of many help files), ask a co-worker or someone
from your office’s information technology department, or do a quick search for help
on the Web. Go to a search engine and type in something like ”set up filters in
Microsoft Outlook” (substituting your e-mail program’s name) and you’ll likely find
links to useful tutorials.

Plead for mercy

It’s common for people to set up e-mail ”away messages” (also known as
auto-responders) when they’re out of the office. These are the ”I’ll be out of the
office until” messages that are automatically sent to anyone that sends you a
message while you’re gone.

If you really don’t want people sending tons of stuff while you’re away, say so in
your away message. Example: ”I’ll be out of the office until I recover from the
stress of this job. In the meantime, please don’t send e-mail to me while I’m away.
You may resume filling my inbox up on Sept. 1.”

If you forgot to turn your ”away” message on before you left, and you can do it
remotely at the nearest cybercafe or public library with Internet access.

Slash and burn

Once you’re back from your well-deserved R&R, you need to be ruthless with the
delete key. If you normally have your mail set to display the newest messages first,
hit the ”sort by sender” button. This is a quick way to bring some order to the
chaos of several hundred messages.

Wipe out the spam first. It’s pretty easy to spot, and it usually comes in multiples.
Highlight whole blocks of this stuff and hit delete.

If you subscribe to e-mail newsletters, highlight those as a block and wipe them
out. Trust me. You won’t go back and read two week’s worth of that daily
e-journal. Don’t clutter your mailbox with stuff to read later. Instead, hit the Web
site that sends you the newsletter and search the archive. Most sites archive their
e-missives, suitable for perusal any time.

You can also choose to temporarily unsubscribe from anything that you receive
frequently, or check to see if the site allows you to put a ”vacation hold” on their
mailings.

Chow down

Once you’ve trimmed off entire blocks of unwanted and non-essential mail, things
should be looking pretty good. You should be left with the prime cuts. It’s now OK
to start opening and reading.

If you’ve got multiple messages dealing with one subject (sort by subject to check),
make sure to read all of the related messages before responding. It’s possible
someone’s addressed the issue or answered the question already.

Go away a few days and it becomes clear how big a problem e-mail pileup can
become. For more tips on handling e-mail overload, see the following Web sites:

overcomeemailoverload.com.

email.about.com

Michelle Johnson is a freelance writer. She can be reached at
[email protected].

© Copyright 2002 Globe Newspaper Company.

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