Email can be VERY distracting. Is the first thing you do, when you get to the office, is check your email? Do you find yourself checking your email more then once an hour? Do you check your email as an avoidance tactic…”I’ll just quickly check my email before I call/do/write/research…” Do you flag emails, place them in folders or better yet, set up rules so they automatically go into folders – then forget about them?
Todays 4M task is about managing your email. Organizing Guru, Julie Morgenstern, said it quite succinctly:
“E-mail is the biggest time-suck of the modern workday…E-mail plays a leading role in the development of our supremely impatient culture, where everything has to be “now, now, now!” People expect immediate responses, because an immediate response seems possible.”
Julie Morgenstern ~ Never Check Email in the Morning
So what would happen if you didn’t check your email first thing in the morning? I am not saying don’t check it at all, I am just suggesting, as per Ms. Morgenstern, not to check in the first hour of your work day.
As Morgenstern argues, if you concentrate on one important task and then only check your email after an hour, you may find that you are more productive.
If you would like to try this little experiment, I invite you to decide at the end of today which important task needs your full attention tomorrow morning. Choose the task that would help you generate revenue in your business and plan to do JUST THAT for an hour tomorrow.
That is the way I started my day and my most important task today was to work on on a few blog posts…go figured, it worked for me – ‘cause here it is… Did it work for you? Let me know.
Margarita Ibbott is a Professional Organizer, Presenter, Blogger, Social Media Trainer, wife and mother of three. She brings order to people, places and things and then blogs about it.
Her most recent adventures brought her to Chicago to be a LiveBlogger for Oprah’s Life Classes (not once but twice). She continues on her quest to keep evangelizing brands, companies, people and products using Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Blogging
Margarita Ibbott is a travel and lifestyle blogger. She blogs about travel in Canada, the United States and Europe giving practical advice through restaurant, hotel and attraction reviews. She writes for DownshiftingPRO.com and other online media outlets.
I’m checking my email before I run off to a clients this morning… ahhh. 🙂 What a challenge! But knowing that I WILL accomplish more of my goals by doing the MOST important thing first each day is so true!
Do you flag emails, place them in folders or better yet, set up rules so they automatically go into folders – then forget about them? NOT GUILTY
Because the majority of my work is based on emails received from clients, it’s not practical for me to keep Outlook closed. However, that’s not an excuse for:
Is the first thing you do, when you get to the office, is check your email? GUILTY
Do you find yourself checking your email more then once an hour? GUILTY
Do you check your email as an avoidance tactic…”I’ll just quickly check my email before I call/do/write/research…” GUILTY
Thanks for this important reminder.
I’ve been trying to implement this strategy. Sometimes it’s also difficult to avoid social media for the first hour.