Brief: By constantly looking at your inbox, you can only ever be reactive, not proactive. You control it, it shouldn’t control you.

I get asked by some entrepreneurs and startup people about how to manage their inbox better so they can stay focused. I hear your pain, but it’s the wrong question. It should be, how do I make my inbox only a select part of my day in a startup?

Your inbox can only give you things from other people to do. It will never be a source of independent thought, ideas or inspiration. A lot of people use it as a direction of what to do next. That’s a trap. It’s addictive. And it’s easy. “I don’t have to think or prioritise, I’ll just check my email and someone else will tell me what I should do next”. It can kill you. If you’re busy, like we all are, then you could spend your whole day at your inbox and get nothing new/important/big done. I’m a big believer in knowing your big-rocks from Stephen Covey and prioritising them.

What % of emails are actually urgent? Really? 1%, maybe 5%. If you think people expect you to answer emails quickly then you’ve got to shake that. The rule should be that you’ll get back to them as soon as you can and if it is urgent, call you.

Yes, emails are where you hear from your team, your customers and your family, but you can’t be beholden to it. It’s slowing you down – trust me.

If you believe in this, then the key is to keep your inbox on a leash. Use it when you want to use it. Use it how you want to use it. There are lots of good tips on how to do this. I use inbox zero like in four hour workweek but you can google a lot more. I’m not exactly perfect on this, but it works a lot better than having 3,000 emails in there and having to refer to it every 5 minutes.

Some other tips;

• I’d also advise closing down your inbox or putting it in a different window or space and minimising it so you can’t see it.
• Turn off all notifications. Email notifications are just a distraction. Once again, 99% of emails are not urgent AND important.

Got any others?

Put your inbox in its place and stay focused longer.