Since I’ve been delivering personal productivity training and coaching, spanning seven years working as a David Allen Company accredited coach helping people to implement the Getting Things Done methodology, and more recently delivering our own personal productivity approach, I’ve seen an awful lot of email inboxes. Different people manage their inboxes in different ways but one of the things that I’ve noticed is that, before they do the training and implement our approach, most people have some kind of "yuk" feeling associated with their inbox.

It seems that most people have at least SIX different types of email sitting in their inbox. And people tell me that there are emails in their inboxes that they have opened and looked at and then closed twice, three times… even a dozen or more times! But for most people, thinking and re-thinking what each of these emails is about isn’t a whole lot of fun. And it means that every time they look at what’s in their inbox they have to re-think what is going on and try to figure out all over again which of the six types of thing each email is and what needs to happen about it.

At least the unread ones tend to stand out as they’re normally bold. Except some people even manage to mess that up for themselves. Opening an email and deciding they can’t be doing with it right then, they close the email and mark it unread. Now they’ve got SEVEN types of email, including those they really haven’t read and those they’re just pretending they haven’t read! No wonder most people have some kind of "yuk" feeling associated with their inbox!

So what are the most common types of email I see?

First of all there is the email they’ve read and there’s no action associated with it and they don’t need to keep it for reference. It shouldn’t really be in there any more because it’s finished with and it should have been deleted. But… they haven’t got round to deleting it yet. So, for now, it’s just sitting there…

Second is the email they’ve read and there’s no action associated with it but they think they may need to refer back to it at some later date. That one really shouldn’t be in there any more either because it should be filed away somewhere. But…they haven’t got around to filing it away yet. So, for now, it’s just sitting there…

Third is the email they’ve read and they’ve decided there is an action on it but they haven’t quite decided what that action is yet. The email is parked there as a reminder that they need to do something about it… once they figure out just exactly what it is that they want to do. So, for now, it’s just sitting there…

Fourth is the email they’ve read and they’ve decided that there is an action on it and they have actually decided what it is that they want to do but they just haven’t quite got round to doing that action yet. The email is parked there as a reminder that, when they get some time in between all those meetings that they have to go to, they really need to do that action that they’ve decided to do. So, for now, it’s just sitting there…

Fifth is the email they’ve read and they’ve figured out what it was that they needed to do about it AND they’ve actually done that action. But now someone owes them a reply and so the email is parked there as a reminder that they have done something but the game isn’t over yet because somebody owes them something back and they might need to chase it. And if they lose sight of the email they might forget that the thing isn’t finished yet. So, for now, it’s just sitting there…

Sixth – and this is the only type of email that really belongs in an inbox – is the one they haven’t read yet.

WOW! No wonder most people’s brains hurt when they look at their inbox.

Our approach makes it safe for you have a real inbox – that is one where the only items in it are the ones you’ve not read yet. It does this by having a secure system outside of your inbox to track those different kinds of things that you need to remind yourself about. Once you know how to answer those two vital questions; "What’s the desired outcome?" and "What’s the next action?" and how to park the answers to those questions in a system that you absolutely trust, you no longer need to hold all those different things jumbled up in your inbox in a way that causes confusion and stress.

If you’ve already implemented our approach you’ll know this. But, if your inbox makes your brain hurt, do yourself a favour… go through and delete the things you don’t need and file away the things you may want to refer back to later. Then decide on the desired outcomes for your projects and put those on a "Projects" list. Next decide what specific next actions you need to take and put those on your "Next Action" lists (unless of course they take less than two minutes in which case just do them right now!). Finally note anything where you are waiting for someone else to do something and put that on a "Waiting For" list.

If you do all that then the only emails in your email inbox will be the ones you’ve not read yet. The feeling of liberation and the amount of creative energy that is freed up as a result of having a ‘real’ inbox is just amazing. Try it and see! I’d love to know how you get on…