Do you know how to reduce email-related distractions?

All of us who work most of our time in front of a PC have, at least once, found ourselves dissatisfied with our day. We aimed to do a certain number of things (it doesn’t matter how many), we had a to-do list, and inevitably we ended up with a series of items on our list still pending. This admission makes us feel unsatisfied, and what’s more, stressed and fatigued, almost oppressed by a constant sense of urgency and the unfulfilled need to complete the tasks we set for ourselves.

This can depend on various factors, and among these, distractions and urgencies that come our way due to the will/needs of others – thanks to their “precious and beloved” emails -certainly play an important role.

The first electronic mail text was sent in 1971: since then, the birth of email has encouraged, accelerated, and simplified communication. Email, a formidable tool in its origins, underwent a degeneration as it spread professionally and, from a valuable ally, became one of the hardest distractions to keep at bay. We achieved an increase in circulating information, but we did not learn to manage the growing complexity in tandem: the steady growth in the number of emails we receive and send every day, and the difficulty of filtering the information relevant to us.

Many of us are (some used to be) obsessed with compulsively checking emails in real time, finding ourselves unable to stay focused (in meetings, while performing a task, on the train, …) without checking – multiple times – mail and messaging apps.
We cannot “unplug” wherever we are, and we accept an additional source of stress into our lives.

On average, a modern worker spends between 5 and 20 hours a week reading and managing their emails. Those who receive two hundred emails every day (and for us, this is a “pathological” threshold) admit that only a percentage between 10% and 20% turns out to be useful.
And let us emphasize that the increase in email volume and the increase in smartphone screen time go hand in hand.

Too often, moreover, we work in organizations that do very little to bring this tool back to its initial purpose: transmitting important information to targeted and selected recipients, without expecting an instantaneous response.
All of this is causing negative effects on productivity and performance that can no longer be ignored by entrepreneurs and managers.

Without aiming for such profound results, which require a dedicated commitment at a company and group level, with this article we want to share some good practices and tips that are as simple as they are important, which can help improve personal management of digital communications right away, to find the ability to keep our working time on the track of our strategic priorities.

Emails, with the urgencies they impose on us, direct our work from the outside and produce distractions that lower our performance.

To contain the damage and reduce waste of time and energy, here are some techniques to apply right away, useful both for better managing our emails and for facilitating email management for the people who work with us:

• Turn off notifications. The most frequent mistake is keeping all notifications always on and Outlook (or any other mail application) always open, ready to receive unsolicited—and sometimes unnecessary—information from the outside that distracts us by continuously demanding our attention. Remember that email is not a synchronous tool. Replying within 24 hours is an acceptable timeframe: for emergencies, there are other tools.
• Batching & Slotting: we are not obliged, and in fact, it is counterproductive to reply immediately to all incoming emails the moment they arrive. It is much better to set specific time slots in your calendar to read and manage emails. A frequency of 2-3 times a day is sufficient, perhaps just before lunch break, or before ending our workday: going to lunch or going home will be goals that provide a limit to that task.
• CEPE (Collect, Elaborate, Plan, Execute): We reiterate the principle that it is wrong to reply to all emails immediately. As with all other activities of the day, working or otherwise, it is better to apply the CEPE method: Collect, Elaborate, Plan, Execute. Only in this way can we be sure not to let ourselves be driven by emails (and others’ requests) and to best manage our activities and strategic priorities.
• Touch & Go: If the effort required to complete a request contained in an email is less than a couple of minutes, you must handle it immediately without returning to it, because your activation time would otherwise equal the time already spent reading it the first time.
• Limit CCs: Let’s explicitly request not to be CC’ed on everything that might be of interest to us but is not our responsibility. We will go and ask for the information ourselves if we want it, when we need it. If someone wants something from us, let’s make sure it is asked of us explicitly. If we want something from someone, let’s ask for it in an equally direct and specific way.
• Write catchy and clear subject lines: Help other people better manage incoming emails by writing a compelling subject line that can be understood immediately. The subject line must be short, self-explanatory, and consistent with the content you are transmitting. Remember, moreover, that email is often read on smartphones, and mobile devices usually display only the first five or six words of the subject line: try to express everything in those few words!
• Clarify the required action: Clarify the behavior expected from the email recipient. Working on the accessibility of information means lightening up the task of the reader, providing in a simple manner all the useful information to complete the task we are delegating via email. To write emails that work and get what you need, you must be clear about what behavior you want to obtain from the counterpart and follow a structure where you explain the problem in a couple of lines and then the solution, i.e., the request you are about to make. In this way, you will be both persuasive and concise.
• Communicate your email management methods to colleagues. This will avoid misunderstandings, encourage alternative communication methods, and, above all, serve as a concrete example for a new way of working, in which emails and messages are more effective if used correctly.