The purpose of this document is to describe a method for managing your inbox. It is also in the scope of this document to give advice and guidelines about managing communication in general, following up on issues and keeping track of tasks. This document will not cover the technical aspects of managing email such as configuration issues, connecting to the email server, offline and online operation or PST files.

I wrote this document when I was asked how I manage 200 received and about 100 sent emails per day, following up on them somewhat long-term while still being productive. This may or may not work for you, it does work for me. Let me know of you have better ideas.

Microsoft Outlook

It is a common misconception to define Microsoft Outlook as an email client. A much closer definition, also adopted by the parent company, is that Outlook is a Personal Information Manager. The true power of the application lies in its tight integration with the Microsoft Exchange communication platform.

While outlook has many powerful features let’s focus on the most commonly used:

Feature	Description
Mail	Outlook includes a powerful email client which integrates with MS Exchange server. It includes all standard email facilities, including the ability to file emails in folders and have the folders synchronized with the Exchange server. This last feature is particularly important because you will have access to email in the same format no matter if you are using Outlook on your computer or you are using the web access feature.
Calendar	The calendar feature allows you to keep track of your appointments in order to be able to effectively plan your days, meetings and personal issues that consume your time. The integration with Exchange facilitates access to other people appointments in order to coordinate tasks and meetings. Calendar items always have reminders in order to insure that you do not forget to attend a particular item from your calendar.
Tasks	The Tasks feature is an advanced To-Do list which allows you to keep track of things to do or to follow up with other people. Items in the task list can also have deadlines, reminders and also have a rudimentary progress tracking by percentages. Tasks are quite similar with calendar items but they do not necessarily enforce a specific time frame for performing them and involve the owner only, not several people.

A common characteristic of all features is the ability to have files attached and rich text format in their contents. This allows you to better understand what the particular item is about and how to address it properly.

Another advanced feature is that any mail can be transformed in a calendar item or task and the other way around. This allows you to effectively keep track of all issues you are handling and also share them with colleagues via email.

Email

Email is a quick way of business communication that facilitates rapid transfer of information. While email does not replace verbal communication it has the advantage of keeping a written record of all discussed issues and agreements reached. For very urgent issues make sure you use verbal communication but follow up with an email recording all things discussed.  Use email for any other communication but feel free to support the contents of your email with a phone call as a matter of courtesy.

Since email is such a quick method of communication it is generally expected that you act quickly on it. Make sure you check your email at least every hour during business hours.

Since email is easily forwarded NOT a secure medium of communication make sure all your emails are written in a professional manner and do not contain sensitive information (such as usernames, passwords, etc). If secure information has to be transferred over email make sure it uses some form of encryption.

A common rule of thumb for email is: “Do not put anything in an email that you wouldn’t be comfortable seeing in tomorrow’s newspaper”.

Managing incoming email

One feature of Outlook is “Rules and Alerts” which allows you to automatically move emails that arrive in your inbox to a predefined folder. Make sure you DO NOT USE this feature. Email that is automatically filed usually has a high chance of being missed and you will not read it on time.

As a general rule of thumb all your email needs to arrive in your inbox and it should stay there until the matter is dealt with or delegated. Resist the temptation of filing emails before the issue has been fully closed in order not to lose track of your workload.

Once an issue is being dealt with or delegated the email should be filed to a relevant folder in order not to clutter up your inbox.

Folders

Email folders offer a convenient way to file messages in a structured way. Email folders should be created in a way that reflects your daily activities, NOT your correspondence partners. In general you should have a folder reflecting all the projects you are involved in, some common tasks you are performing and committees you are involved.

Do not create folders for a specific person since you are likely to discuss a variety of subjects with that person. Over time emails structured by person will end up an unstructured collection of emails on a multiple subjects.

For very large projects that have multiple facets you can create subfolders that capture the emails covering the specific component of the project.

Using this method of filling will always display in your inbox the issues that are pending with you, effectively transforming your inbox in a to-do list. Outlook will display in the lower left corner the number of items in your inbox, giving a quick overview of your workload.

Of course you will always end up with a fee emails that are not part of any project, task or common activity. You can file these emails under a folder called “Done” in order to keep a log of it once it is handled.

Delegate issues

If a particular email is of your concern but it is not your responsibility to deal with or you require additional input from a third party you must delegate the issue. Make sure you delegate issues a soon as you recognize them in order not to delay the closure of the issue. In order to delegate an issue forward the email to the relevant person and add your notes in the email. However keep in mind that the issue I not resolved. In order to keep track of the issue create a task in you Task list to remind you to follow up on the delegated issue. At this point the email can be filed in a folder but the task will be kept as a reminder until the issue is fully resolved.

Outlook offers a convenient way of creating a task on a delegated issue:

The follow up button will create a task for you to follow a particular email even if it has been filed. Keep in mind that the task by default will not have a reminder. If the issue is important make sure you add a reminder that will pop up when the issue is due.

The follow-up button is accessible also on emails that have already been sent in case you forget to set it when sending the email.

In general make sure you follow up on issues every second day but feel free to follow up more often if the issue is of urgency.

When adding a reminder or a custom date on the task (other than today, tomorrow, this week, next week or no date) you will get a date selection dialogue. The date selection dialogue supports “Natural Language” for speedy input. This means that in order to select the dates you don’t necessarily have to use the drop down menu.  Microsoft Outlook will understand input such as “2d” (which means 2 days from now), “in 3 weeks” (in 3 weeks from now), “next Monday” (outlook will select the upcoming Monday) or more complicated statements like “Monday in 3 w” (which will be interpreted as the first Monday 3 weeks from now). In any way make sure you double check if Outlook has correctly interpreted your input until you become comfortable with this type of input.

Managing outgoing email

When sending an email on an issue of particular importance make sure you follow up on it. You cannot assume that the recipient will effectively address your issue so you will need to follow up on it. Send and forget is not an effective strategy.

Make sure you set a follow-up task on outgoing email as described in the previous section. If you followed up on an email and still do not get any response make sure you call the person in cause to inquire about the specific issue.

If you do not receive satisfactory response on your issues in a timely fashion and the issue is affecting your work performance escalate the issue to your line manager in order to obtain a speedy resolution.

Managing Tasks

Microsoft Outlook 2007 offers a very handy “To-Do Bar”. The bar will display a list of your upcoming meetings and tasks. Tasks that have been created as described in the previous section will have as title the subject of the email. Double clicking on the task will bring up the email in cause no matter where it was filed.

The tasks are segregated by date with the issues pending for today conveniently displayed in the “Today” section.  Issues with a reminder set will have a bell next to them; otherwise they will only have a flag.  Clicking the flag will mark the issue as complete and will take it off your To-Do list (however the original email will remain intact).

Keep your “To-Do bar” visible in order to keep an eye on all pending issues and check your tasks frequently in order to follow up on them effectively.

If you have spare time make sure to check the other sections of your to-do list, maybe some issues can be resolved ahead of time.

Managing your calendar

Your calendar reflects the meetings you have planned for the day. The free/busy times can be viewed by the whole organization and allows anyone to schedule a meeting with you at a mutually convenient time. Make sure you mark in your calendar all times when you know you are going to be busy, out of the office or do not wish to be disturbed for very specific reasons.

The Outlook calendar view includes in the bottom section also a list of your tasks. This allows you to estimate the expected workload for a day in the future.

This way you are able to assess the time available to plan upcoming meetings.

You should check your calendar at the beginning of each day in order to assess the workload for the given day and towards the end of each day to make sure there are no calendar conflicts in the upcoming days.

Email workflow

Note: Outlook and Exchange are products of Microsoft Corporation. I am not affiliated with Microsoft in any way and not even a particular fan of their products. However I do think Exchange is one of their best products and Outlook is a well polished product (although somewhat sluggish). Any suggestions for alternatives are welcomed.