43 Folders

Back to Work

Merlin’s weekly podcast with Dan Benjamin. We talk about creativity, independence, and making things you love.

Join us via RSS, iTunes, or at 5by5.tv.

”What’s 43 Folders?”
43Folders.com is Merlin Mann’s website about finding the time and attention to do your best creative work.

Dealing with overdetermined E-mails

Forgive the bad psychobabble joke, what I'm talking about is an E-mail that simultaneously informs you of 15 conferences, any of which may or may not be relevant. I get these at University but I assume that people elsewhere get something similar; a giant E-mail with many parts, only some of which is relevant. The initial problem is that it's "stuff" that defies the 2 minute rule--each item might take 2 minutes just to consider.

But it's not so important how long the processing takes, it's more a question of how to track it afterwards. Do you print off a copy and put it in several places in a tickler with different parts circled? Save it into different files in a digital tickler? Relevant information straight into a calendar?

I'm interested because sometimes the conferences are not for months to come, and I may or may not be interested, but want to think about it again later. The problem is, saving a massive E-mail like this isn't very conducive to that, because when I see it again, some of the dates will have past--and as Allen predicts, my mind goes numb to these E-mails, which especially after a week or two, mix actionables and non-actionables.

CathyHughes's picture

I copy the portion of...

I copy the portion of the email relevant to me into a calendar event (Outlook). If there's a due by date for registering, I give it a reminder of a week in advance for time to consider it. I then usually ditch the rest of the email. If there's more than one item in the email I'm interested in, I put each item into its own calendar event. This way it's read and actioned and not sitting in a TBR pile that I usually don't tackle. Most of my TBR items end up being Someday/Maybes :(

I'm also interested in how others tackle this differently

 
EXPLORE 43Folders THE GOOD STUFF

Popular
Today

Popular
Classics

An Oblique Strategy:
Honor thy error as a hidden intention


STAY IN THE LOOP:

Subscribe with Google Reader

Subscribe on Netvibes

Add to Technorati Favorites

Subscribe on Pageflakes

Add RSS feed

The Podcast Feed

Cranking

Merlin used to crank. He’s not cranking any more.

This is an essay about family, priorities, and Shakey’s Pizza, and it’s probably the best thing he’s written. »

Scared Shitless

Merlin’s scared. You’re scared. Everybody is scared.

This is the video of Merlin’s keynote at Webstock 2011. The one where he cried. You should watch it. »