Marie-Claire AssekoThis is a summary of the Season 2 – Episode 6 of The Kaizen Gal podcast titled “A Few More Hacks to Organize Work”, the sixth installment of series on Time & Priorities Management.
The goal of the series is to help you effectively prioritize and adopt consistent time management strategies. I will expand on these strategies but they include:
- Learning to reconcile time management with that of your personal or professional environment;
- Identifying your strengths and weaknesses and build a time management strategy adapted to your personality;
- Optimizing time and energy management;
- Maintaining and increase your credibility and control in managing demands and priorities.
Why You Should Better Organize Emails, Calls And Meetings
Much of our communication for work and school occurs over emails, phone calls and, for professionals, meetings! These 3 communication channels can derail our schedules as well. I mean, who has never been sucked into a 5-min phone call or a virtual meeting that ended up lasting for 45?
If you want to invest your time in what matters to you, it is necessary to identify the timewasters in your (work or school) rhythm, their causes and effects, and then find ways to counter them.
Today I’ll share some tried-and-true guidelines and ideas for organizing phone calls, emails, and meetings that have helped me monitor how I spend my time and ensure that I invest it towards my goals.
Managing Emails
- Sort them out! A few of my own labels: priority, secondary, to delegate, to file and to put to the trash or to flag as spam.
- Most email inboxes allow you to create rules and filters to move incoming emails automatically. And I cannot recommend them enough!
- If I told myself that I’d read and file an email and I still don’t know what that email is about a week later, I delete it. It means I don’t need whatever information it contains.
- Schedule specific periods of time to read, sort and reply to your emails.
- Listen, I am inbox 0 to a fault BUT these micro-interruptions of time and focus can quickly add up to a lot of time. Being proactive on emails is not critical work!
- For instance, you can tackle them at the beginning of your shift, before or after your lunch break and at the end of your shift. During those timeslots, whatever email you open, you commit to processing ~ that 1:1 relationship is key so you don’t accumulate emails.
Storytime: Emails After Vacation!
Emergencies will find a way to get to you when needed – trust me!
I used to make it a point to read all my emails when returning from vacation. Somehow it made sense to me that I could ingest 300+ emails in one 8-hour shift and be caught up by my second day back. Until I read an article on productivity that made a lot more sense. In a nutshell: whatever information or issue in the oldest emails probably found their way to the right person or have been solved already by the time you come back!
So I decided to focus solely on the emails sent over the last 5 business days, and put the rest away in a folder I named “ARCHIVES”. Lo and behold, to this day, 10+ years later, I still don’t know what these emails were about and I have never been asked about them. As I have climbed the corporate ladder since, and with it I experienced a significant increase in the volume of emails in my absence, I now only look at emails from the past 2 business days.
Writing Efficient Emails
What is an efficient email? It is an email that clearly relays a message to the recipient while driving the person to take a desired action or decision in return.
It is an email that moves projects or conversations forward!
There are many articles out there on writing efficient emails and below are the tips I always apply:
- Have a clear subject for your email, even if it’s long, it should give the receiver a feel for the level of urgency with which to approach the email’s content.
- I know it’s tempting but don’t mix up topics, 1 email = 1 topic. People end up not reading the email in its entirety (and putting it off) OR getting confused when there’s too much information to process. You’re overstimulating them in writing and not everybody will be okay with it.
- Summarize the purpose or context of the email at the beginning.
- If any attached document, describe what it contains.
- Use lists rather than paragraphs. And don’t write paragraphs as elements of your lists! It will force you to summarize.
- Always end your emails with what you’ll do next and an ask to the recipient that requires a yes or no OR that involves taking action.
Preparing For Calls And Meetings
Whether it’s a traditional phone call (with your cellphone) or an online call:
- Group several calls together at convenient times if possible. For example, you can dedicate a block of time in the morning or afternoon or, a specific day of the week to tackle them all.
- If you get impromptu phone calls, try to rebook the full conversation at a more convenient time.
For online meetings, you have to be more specific as they sometimes don’t have the same level of formality as in-person meetings:
- Before agreeing to a meeting, find out what the goal of the meeting is, its agenda and who will attend. No goal = no meeting.
- If you’re the host, start with topics relevant to the most participants so that people can gradually leave the meeting when their topic of expertise has been discussed.
- If you’re a participant, prepare your interventions: define your goal, list the elements you want to discuss and have the necessary documents at hand.
- Mind the time to ensure that all the elements in the agenda are going to be covered.
- Don’t multitask while in a meeting and respect people speaking their piece.
- Conclude the meeting by listing the main actions agreed upon by all, the responsibilities of each participant involved, the date of the next meeting and thank the participants.
- Don’t forget to send a recap email as well! As the French saying goes: “Words vanish, writing remains”.
Handling Interruptions From People
- When approached by someone with a request, gently and/or politely ask the person to schedule an appointment based on availability in your calendar;
- If you must respond immediately, clearly inform the person of the time you have available BEFORE starting the discussion;
- Route or redirect requests to the right people;
- If appropriate, and if possible, delegate to others;
- To quickly wrap up a conversation that’s dragging out, use phrases such as “before you finish” and summarize the important points made and the actions to be taken.
Most often than not, unplanned interruptions from people
are the most time-consuming disruptors of your workflow.
TL;DR – Better Organize Emails, Calls And Meetings
- Define specific times to check your emails at and don’t peek before then. Anything urgent will find its way to you!
- Write emails so clear that someone not involved in the conversation would understand what you’re asking for, 1 email = 1 topic. The level of detail depends on your organizational standing and your audience.
- No goal = no meeting. Be strict about it, with yourself and with others.
- Enforce boundaries around set schedule. If you consistently treat your time like it’s a finite and valuable resource to you, people will understand.
By better organizing my emails, calls and meetings, I have been able to engage more efficiently with colleagues and friends; less time, reduced miscommunication, etc. It has also taught people how to best approach me to get what they want! It’s a win-win in my book!
Onto the seventh post of the series!
