Why am I on this e-mail?

Confessions of an Inbox Zero Addict

Photo by Mariia Shalabaieva on Unsplash

This last week I have been a slave to the inbox. Not in the noble sense of efficient correspondence, but in the depressing sense of unknowingly using my inbox as my to-do list. I know this is wrong. We shouldn’t do it. But after a blissful stretch of annual leave, I returned to find my inbox looked like it had been through some kind of academic summer sale: chaotic, endless, and full of things I never wanted in the first place.

I am an Inbox Zero girl at heart which can make me spiral into rage when someone hits ‘Reply All’ on an e-mail thread I shouldn’t have even been on to begin with. This week I was cc’d on something ‘just to keep you aware’ when actually a one-minute corridor chat would have sufficed. Instead, I had an entire week watching strangers failing to efficiently organise a piss-up in a brewery until I became that person — the tragic soul I usually chuckle at: “please remove me from these e-mails.”

Inbox Zero is doable by the way. There are certainly times when it all goes down the pan but I usually get back on track with it after a good admin day. My system is simple (I think?), militant and perhaps just a tad petty:

I allow myself in (properly) usually twice a day (I aim not to have it constantly open, no notifications anywhere). I put these as 30 minute calendar entries dedicating the time to forcing the inbox back to zero. My rules:

• If it takes <5 minutes: respond, delegate, and/or action immediately. Then either delete, or move to Reference, Action required or Chase folders (see below). The exception to this rule? E-mails that make you really angry - whilst these can be responded to in less than five minutes - they rarely should! Examples of e-mails I almost/wanted to send last week can be found at the end of this post (a regular feature perhaps?)

• Delete: read, roll your eyes/mutter piss off! and discard.

• Reference folder: for things I may one day need, but let’s be honest, probably won’t. The search function is faster than 4,000 subfolders - I reluctantly converted to this as my natural preference is for neat organisation!

• Action Required folder: the “new inbox.” Once the real inbox is empty, if I have time left, I pick off tasks here. If the task is too chunky to be dealt with in my 30 minute e-mail slots or a small deadlined ‘important but not urgent’ task, then it becomes a calendar item or to-do list entry. Otherwise, it sits forever in Action Required, haunting me.

• Weekly purge: I try to schedule ad-hoc time when needed to chew through Action Required. Sometimes you need an admin day. Action Required never gets to zero and that’s okay. I’ve made peace with my new mini-inbox of misery.

• Unsubscribe folder: I set a rule so that anything with “unsubscribe” in the body of the e-mail lands here automatically. During my 30-minute e-mail sessions or admin days I delete, unsubscribe, or report spam. Sometimes though to keep me on my toes important/interesting e-mails sneak in here if they have come from, for example, funder newsletters or our research management system. You have to look out for those and exempt senders/keywords from this rule.

• The ‘Chase’ Folder. This is my academic hoard of unfulfilled promises. It’s where e-mails with ongoing requests/questions that I need to monitor and chase go. Rightly or wrongly, I tend to ignore this folder until I have mustered up the special kind of energy required to chase something (again) with increasing exasperation/fury. You have to be in the mood for that.

So yes, I made it back to Inbox Zero this week. But not without muttering why am I on this e-mail? at least 37 times.

I would love to hear how other academics cope with their inbox hell?

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E-mails I almost sent this week:

• Why am I on this e-mail?

• Thank you for marking this as urgent. It’s comforting to know that our entire research environment hinges on whether column D is aligned correctly.

• No. We do not need a meeting.

• Why yes, I did receive that order that took half a year to process. I’m hugging it right now and whispering sweet nothings to the packing slip. Do you need photos?

• I have already supplied this information. Several times.

• The deadline is tomorrow, it’s a bit fucking late now!

• We have been reimbursed several hundred pounds of travel money, just be grateful and put it into the departmental account, I will not justify this already justified and approved expenditure again.

• Why am I on this email? Honestly. Why? ARGHHHHHHH