Email "signatures" - no big deal?

I have been working with a lot of accountants on their email habits lately. Surprisingly to me, the signature you put at the bottom of emails has been a big topic of conversation.

Some considerations:

• If you are looking for a consistent way to represent your organization's "brand", a consistent signature seems appropriate.
• If you are focused on providing the other person what they probably most need from your signature .... how can they contact you immediately if they want to talk live (i.e. email is just not efficient based on the issue(s) that need to be discussed) then give them your phone number. Some I've worked with get creative with this. They will have one signature with their office number and one with their mobile number depending on where they are that day. (Obviously these folks want to be immediately reachable!) Nothing can be more frustrating to someone to try and look through an email thread and not be able to find your phone number!
• Too much really can be too much! It might be nice to provide all of your contact information. (That makes it easy for us to create a contact file of you.) However, when you add your twitter account, your facebook page, your blog, your resume, and your life history, we may get annoyed. Note for twitter and linkedin and facebook pages, there are small icon-links you can create to save space. For example, here are the directions for linkedin. Facebook and Twitter directions are here.
• Don't spend too much time in focusing on your signature. Maybe create it once and be done with it?! If you have considered these options listed above, you are probably going to have a "responsible" signature. If you want to change it every so often go for it. It may have a "branding" impact (and that may be important to some) but don't let this consume too much of your time .... so you can get back to all those emails!!

If anyone wants to learn how you can save hundreds of hours a year for yourself, become more sane by getting out from inbox overload, or save thousands of hours for your organization contact me at brian@moxiepartners.com.

The first step to BETTER EMAIL

Email overload! Ever heard of it? Ever really .... really .... really ..... felt it?

It seems to me I have never ever met someone who has told me ....

"Brian I don't receive enough emails"

"Brian I don't really spend enough time in processing emails"

"Brian I always get my inbox down to zero every day. I wish that were more challenging."

OK, email can be a very complex issue for some, though in some ways, it SHOULD be a simpler issue, but we'll save that for another time.

First, let's start simple and end this blog post: If you feel like you could be more effective in the way you process email, just ask yourself ONE question before you write or read EVERY single email you work with from now on .....

What is the call to action?

Just ask yourself that question and see what happens.

Do you TRUST your "system" or is email hijacking it?

Touch things once! I have blogged about this previously. You have probably heard that comment from many sources. We are only supposed to touch emails once, and letters, and memos, and file folders, and blah blah blah.

The question is -- Why is this so hard? Why do we touch things multiple times?

Think about some emails you receive .... emails that invariably sit in your inbox longer than they should .... emails that you glance at multiple times. This may be because:

1.) You are not sure what to do with it.

2.) You are sure what to do with it, but you need it to stay there to remind you later "what to do".

3.) You are waiting on someone or something else before you take action.

These examples are all inputs that need to go into your "system". Unfortunately when an input comes to us in the form of an email we forget about our "system" and work within our email "system".

Let me explain that a little better with an example: If someone (let's call him Ted) walks into your office and requests you to attend a meeting next week, but you are still not sure if you are going to be on a business trip, you must DO something with that request. "Ted I'll have to get back to you ..." (and you make a note somewhere, put it on a list, make a to-do, etc. so you will know to get back to Ted)

However, if someone sends you an email with the same request to be in a meeting next week, the very same meeting that you are not sure you can attend yet, many of us have conditioned our self to simply leave the email in our inbox. There it is - instead of putting it into your system, you have made your email inbox work as an extra part of your system. Now you have multiple systems!

Put another way, it's as if you told "Ted" to just stay right in your doorway and continue to ask you to attend the meeting UNTIL you are able to get back to him. Poor Ted! He is going to get tired standing there with his mouth open, but Ted actually becomes part of your system because you know he will be there!

So challenge yourself to "process" your emails and take the actions to where they need to be (a to-do list, action list, your calendar, etc.) -- YOUR SINGLE (TRUSTED) SYSTEM!!

Email "processing" on your phone vs. your computer

Whether you have a blackberry, droid, or iPhone .... chances are one of the most common things you do with your phone is check email.

I have not met one accountant in my entire life (yet) that has been able to replicate the way they process emails on their phone with the way they do it on their computer. Using their phone, they might not be able to do some or all of the following:

- Save sent emails into the appropriate folders

- Have an (electronic) task or calendar (or both) open at the same time as an email to check on a project. That is right to date there are no "dual-monitor" phones yet!

- Accept appointment requests (although some phones are now allowing you to do this.)

So why does this matter? Most if not all of us are checking email on our phones and laptops. But, we must understand the limitations when using our phone. You will be more efficient using your laptop because you are not limited in the same ways. So when you want to "ferociously focus" on your email processing and only touching things once, just realize your laptop provides the best medium to do that. Sure, use your phone when you need to and want to, but if the email is not urgent ..... consider ..... GULP (I know this is a tough one for some of us) ..... letting it go until you can fully process it later.

Thank You Emails

The "thank you" email -- There are literally tens of millions of these sent every day. No other information in the email, only a simple thank you.

The main simple and obvious reason I've heard for sending them:

To express gratitude! Than sounds nice!

Do you value the appreciation of others around you expressed in the form of "thank you" emails? Chances are it might sound nice but it really does not resonate. The reason? It is precisely the same as the reason we send them .... it takes no time to do it. We know a hand-written card or a face-to-face gesture takes more time and effort and thus we appreciate that more. So if you want to really express gratitude, do it in a more memorable (but maybe less frequent) way.

Challenge your "thank you" emails all together and see if you don't send out less but do other things, just maybe better things, in their place.

Touching Things ONCE

So we can probably agree that our inability to touch certain inputs (emails, voicemails, memos, etc.) once can be a productivity limiter.

That email in your inbox, the oldest one in there ... how many times have you opened it? Glanced at it? Thought about it?

Some of the causes of "multiple touching":

1.) Indecision - something needs to be done but you are not sure or you are not ready to make the decision. You need more time or you are just unsure in general.

2.) Procrastination - this is not always the same as indecision. We might know what needs to happen, we just don't want to do it!

3.) Lack of confidence in your system - You have an email or a voicemail but you cannot delete it because it being there is what will remind you about what needs to get done. You do not trust your system to (1) create clearly defined actions and (2) to remind you about when to do them. So that old email stays in your inbox because that is your (informal and maybe frustrating) system.

So ... Are you tired of continually touching the inputs in your life because they limit the time you spend on the most important things? If the answer is yes, Do you intentionally try and touch things once, process them, and extract the ACTIONS that need to happen into a personal system you have tailored to your own needs, one you trust?!

How Important Are You?

Working with accountants and some of their email, time management, and communication and protocol habits ... the question about how important they are comes up a lot. I am told by a lot of people that they are so important that they must be continuously checking email all the time throughout the day. I am told by them that must continuously keep their "door open" so they can be accessible to others. There may be noble intentions between those policies, culture aspects, or self directed habits, but sometimes that mentality needs to be challenged. It REALLY needs to be challenged! It is these very practices that are also identified by these same accountants as a major source of distractions and unfocused days.

Some questions to ask yourself:

Am I important enough so I can NOT be readily available to colleagues and clients for a certain amount of hours per day?

Am I important enough to shut out all distractions for a certain amount of time each day, so I can singularly focus on the most important items I HAVE prioritized?

Am I important enough so getting the work I WANT to get done actually contributes to my ability to get work done that others tell me is important and to be available to them for questions; and to be fiercely engaged in answering those questions because I feel good about what I am getting done?!?

Do you have Interruption Dependence Disorder?

Interruption Dependence Disorder or "IDD" for short - that is not a real identified disorder in the medical community as far as I can see, but in working with accountants and other knowledge workers, I see it is out there!

Ask yourself:

* Are you "easily" interrupted?

* Are there ever times where you are just not sure what to do next so you gain comfort in checking email or voicemail so you might find something?

* Have you ever been interrupted by someone or something, and then totally forgot about what you were doing first?

* Have you ever allowed your day to be one interruption after another, AND THAT IS IT?

Interruptions happen. It is difficult to be totally interruption free, but maybe if your goal is to minimize interruptions, especially the non-productive ones, first start with your attitude related to IDD.

Do you subconsciously want to be interrupted or do you feel strongly that you want to take charge of your day and minimize them? Make sure your actions and minute to minute attitude match your answer.

Do You Focus on Email Enough? Huh?

The title to this blog post is not a joke. It is a question to ask yourself, only with a twist.

I hear over and over from accountants that email, while a necessary communication tool, is also one of their biggest challenges in managing their days and interruptions.

Here is the question for you ...

When you are checking email, replying to emails, and working within your email system, how focused are you? Do you see it as an opportunity to "get your stuff done" or do you see it as a necessary evil you do throughout your day just to keep your head above water?

We're talking about the intensity of your focus. Are you engaged in the one task at hand? .... Processing emails. Email is so ubiquitous now, it is such a big part of everything we do that maybe, just maybe, it takes over our days. Think about it ... when somebody comes and talks to you in your office, will you have a more productive conversation if you can be solely focused on the conversation? Email is another way to communicate with people. If you make it a task that you do "on the side", how genuinely focused can you be on it?

How productive are you if you have to continually reengage between checking email and doing other tasks? Some people may challenge you to only check email X times per day. People have different opinions on that. But first the question is, can you set aside real focused time to plow through your emails? It will get you back minutes in your day, hours in your week, and days in your year. Try it once, tomorrow. Check your email when you want, but take one 30 minute time slot, block it off and become fiercely focused on processing emails, nothing else.

Email - a Procrastination Tool too?

Have you ever been in a day where you feel so overwhelemed that an email gets you excited? ... Because you know what to do with it. You can accomplish what needs to be done with that particular email, and if only for a second, you feel productive.

What just happened there? An email grabbed your attention because it simply showed up! What ever else you were doing, or what ever else you should be doing, were put on hold. Answering that email enabled your procrastination.

Ask yourself:

Do you ever measure your day based on the number of emails left in your in-box?

How many times a day should YOU be checking email a day? Should it be open all the time?

Is email a productivity tool for you?

Is email a distraction tool for you?

How many emails are in your in-box right now that were also in your in-box last week?

Do you set your daily goals before you check your email?

"Did you get the email?"

Have you ever received a call from someone asking you if you received their email yet? You frantically check your inbox thinking one must have passed you by ... only to realize they have sent it in the last 5 minutes?

One thing to ask yourself ... What are your communication protocols? Do the people you work the most with know what to expect? If they don't they might get crazy and think you should be (1) on email all day, and (2) prioritize their emails all the time.
Some questions to ask yourself:

> What should people expect from me in terms of response times? What is fair? Clients? Colleagues?

> What is the best way for people to reach me when something really is urgent? Do they know this?

> How does the way I process emails help me reach my daily, weekly, and longer term goals? Can I reengineer my process to make it more effective and efficient?

Your "In"box part1

How many emails do you receive a day? How many in a week, month, year? Probably lots. How do you process your emails? Do you have a system that helps you do it in an efficient way?

I have worked with many people one-on-one in their time management. Email is an area I focus on with EVERYONE. Why? Because EVERYONE I know spends a lot of time processing emails. Some process emails continually through the day. Others set certain times during the day to do it. Beyond that though, ask yourself one simple question:

Does your "In"box sometimes work as your "Indecision"box?

How many emails are currently in your inbox that have been in there since the last time you processed emails? How many have been in there since last week?! It's likely that if there are many like that, they are still there because you cannot make a decision on what to do with them or you are using your inbox for something else ... as a ToDo box or a I'll do it later box. In any case it has lost its real intention of being an input box. Now when emails stay in there, they are being re-processed by your brain continuously every time you open up your email. This leads to stress and inefficiency. Do something crazy today. Process all your emails.

To be continued.....