[…] Inbox Zero: Wrapup + Open Thread 43 Folders Series: Inbox Zero So, that’s a wrap for Inbox Zero. I hope you’ve found stuff to make your journey to zero a bit easier and less stressful, and that you’ve discovered the resolve to parlay your newfound inbox emptitude into an ongoing quest for email fu. Doubtless I’ve missed things or neglected to mention one of your favorite tricks. Got a good tool, trick, or attitude change that has helped you keep your inbox empty? Share it in comments. […]

Not sure if it counts but I have a very detailed explaination of how I have kept my e-mail @ zero for quite some time now based largely on Merlin’s past postings, articles and hand-waiving on the on the subject. If can be found here:

http://patrickrhone.com/journal/archives/2006/03/151.html

It involves quite a bit of what has been repeated in the series but still might be interesting to see how it has been put into practice.

I have found your site recently and it already helped me tremendously. For quick sorting my inbox I use Mail Act On. Great app, check it out: http://www.indev.ca/MailActOn.html I have keyboard commands assigned to my folders. ie. a for moving to archive, e for moving to my To Execute folder etc. It really speeds up things!

Keyboard shortcuts are the way to go! If anyone uses Thunderbird, there are two extensions that can be used to map keys your own way: keyconfig + Buttons!. At least for me, they do all that I need: I hit A and archive messages to my archive2006 folder. The rest either gets deleted or answered right away.

Have loved the series. Got my inbox to zero. And adopted the Mail.app responding trick.

My only question about that: why does each rule require that messages be flagged? Surely if a message is in the to-respond folder, then it’s already effectively flagged?

(I keep all these messages marked as “unread” by the way, so that I can see at a glance how many are in each folder.)

I found this series tremendously useful. My work inbox now has at most six or seven messages in it, and those don’t live out the day because I act on them ASAP. Thanks for sharing these tips with us!

Also, I laughed at the Jandek reference in the previous Inbox Zero post!

Great posts! Email is the number 1 challenge to productivity, I have posted an article abot how to cope with in here http://www.techpersonality.com/productivity/howtohandletoomuch_email.html including faster ways to sort and retain data.

Simon

My only question about that: why does each rule require that messages be flagged? Surely if a message is in the to-respond folder, then it’s already effectively flagged?

Yes, but, if I unflag them as I respond to them, they fall out of the associated Smart Folder automatically. Then I just visit my Über Respond-To directory every week or so and manually move the Responded-To messages to Archives.

Just a preference really. YMMV.

I achieved inbox zero at work last year and have kept it that way for six months now. Gmail made it possible and I now replicate a Gmail setup on Outlook. I have two rules that I live by.

1. Don’t decide, archive.

If there’s no obvious action from an email, there’s only one other action. I don’t even decide if I should archive or delete, I just archive the lot. Time and mind are expensive; storage is cheap.

1. No yucky little bold numbers.

There are a handful of lists and notifications that I filter into folders for later browsing, but everything that is not in the Inbox gets marked as read, so I won’t have yucky little bold numbers glaring at me whenever I work on email. This has worked miracles for my Zen and my concentration.

Merlin has mentioned both of these strategies, but for me they were the key mindsets that made everything else possible.

And it would really help if I learned how to type!

For all of those who tried to it the link I left above, here is the real one: http://www.techpersonality.com/productivity/howtohandletoomuch_email.html

And you may want ot check out other tips on handling phonecalls and Instant Messaging here: http://www.techpersonality.com/productivity

Enjoy! Simon

OK, Merlin. Gotcha. Thanks for the explanation.

This was an outstanding series, Merlin. Many, many thanks. I just posted the results of my first day under the Inbox Zero regime.

I had the pleasure of meeting my daughter for the first time about two weeks ago. As the dread of returning to work grew in direct proportion to my waning paternity leave, I studied the Inbox Zero columns with the concentration of a zen master.

Sure enough, when I got back to the office, I had just under 500 emails waiting for me. In 55 minutes, I’d pared that down to 22 messages in need of response and half a legal page of actions to take. Another hour later, I’d dealt with the 22 emails and thrown all the actions into my Kinkless GTD file.

My inbox has remained empty since then. My only fear is that co-workers will interpret this as a lack of work, rather than as a sign of ninja email skillz!

Thanks for the series. I have always — for more than 15 years now — adhered to something very much like the Inbox Zero zen, so I was very interested to here your methods.

I liked most of the advice. Del Del Del — Yes! And Filters are so important. I never thought about the fact that I schedule email dashes, it just happens that way. Once or twice a day (per email address!) I just sit down and do it.

But I have a very different idea of what Zero means. The goal for me is to drive the unread count to zero — mercilessly! But I do not empty my inbox. No no no! That is probably my biggest departure from your methods.

Rather than go on at length here, you’ve inspired me to write my methods down and post them on my blog for anyone interested.

Thanks for you insights. And thanks for motivating me to document my own methods.