ODR News

Welcome to Odr news

Nature

5 Tips to Manage and Organize E-Mail


How do you focus on your urgent e-mail and organize the rest for your review? Think about how you handle your paper mail. You probably sort your paper mail quickly before you read it to figure out what to look at first, what to read later, and what to throw away. Here are some similar ways to automatically process and prioritize your electronic mail for better and faster results:

(Although the following tips refer to Microsoft Outlook, many of these features are similar to those found in other mail systems. For specific how-to steps, and more e-mail and Outlook tips, visit The Software Pro website.)

1. Color Code to Identify Key Messages

Color code priority messages to quickly identify e-mail from your most important contacts such as management, staff, or team members. To apply colors in Microsoft Outlook, highlight a message from a contact, choose Tools > Organize, select the option Using Colors and pick how you want to color-code your incoming messages from the specific contact.

2. Streamline with Categories and Folders

Stop using your Inbox as a reference system filled with messages that don't require an immediate action. To further organize your messages, create categories and folders with useful labels such as Team Members, Projects, Personal, and others. The Categories feature in Microsoft Outlook, for instance, helps to organize and view active messages into groups within your Inbox. Create and use e-mail folders to store messages that you have already handled and wish to keep for history or folders for e-mail that contains informational reading and general reference.

Note that folders and categories sort in alphabetical order which is not likely to place your priority items at the top. Adding a letter or number at the beginning of a label, such as a-Team Members and b-Projects, will sort these towards the top of your Inbox.

3. Filter with Rules

Rules are instructions or filters that automatically categorize, organize, and prioritize messages based on conditions that you set. As new messages are received in Microsoft Outlook, right-click on the message and left click on the command Create a Rule to apply a category or move the message to a folder. If all you do is apply rules, you may be able to get through e-mail in half the time it took before.

4. Learn Easy Navigation

Stop wasting time by moving in and out of each message and start applying simple navigation tricks. In Microsoft Outlook, for instance, you can move in your Inbox with the up or down arrow key to select a message. Then press [Enter] to open the message. To move to the next message directly from the current e-mail, look for toolbar buttons with arrows or press [Ctrl] + > for the next message and [Ctrl] + < for the previous e-mail. Press [Esc] to close the active message.

5. Sort to Find Messages

To quickly sort your e-mail messages, click once on a column heading for the new order you want such as sender, subject or date. For instance, to sort messages by the sender, click once on the Sender heading. By clicking twice on a column heading, the sort order changes from ascending (A-Z) order to descending (Z-A) order. By the way, the abbreviations RE and FW in the Subject line are ignored when you sort messages alphabetically by subject.

Implementing these ideas for overcoming e-mail overload can help you become more productive and free you from your Inbox.

© 2004 by Dawn Bjork Buzbee

Dawn Bjork Buzbee is The Software Pro? and a certified Microsoft Office Expert and Microsoft Office Specialist Master Instructor. Dawn shares smart and easy ways to effectively use software and technology through her work as a speaker, trainer, and consultant. Visit www.SoftwarePro.com">http://www.SoftwarePro.com for great Microsoft Office software tips and tricks or to contact Dawn.

RELATED ARTICLES


Ten Ways To Sell Your Ideas To Anyone
You have a great idea you know is a winner. All you need is support from some key people.
Media Training: Seven Ways to Instantly Improve Your Media Interviewing Skills
Imagine if you were going to address a stadium full of people. You'd probably spend hours (if not days or weeks) agonizing over every word you were going to say.
The Lazy Person Secrets To Overnight Wealth And Fame
There are so many simple, yet really sure-fire ways of acquiring wealth, it's a wonder everybody with even the least bit of ambition isn't already rich. When you come right down to it, the only things needed for anyone to make bundles of money are the long-range vision and the energy to put a money-making plan into force.
Business Goals - The 10 Commandments
The Ten Commandments of Goal Setting While it's good to set goals and work them into a proper plan, the fact is many people succeed in business without setting any goals. Be careful not to set your goals too high.
7 Reasons Why Training Doesn't Produce the Desired Results and What You Can Do To
Seven Reasons Why Training Doesn't Produce the Desired Results and What You Can Do To Improve Your Results OverviewAbraham Maslow said, "If the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail."  As managers, leaders and change agents, we want to improve our organizational performance.
Surviving When Clients Arent Rolling In
As the holiday season starts to settle in, the workload for many Micro-Businesses can slow down.Service-based businesses in particular consider this a slow time of the year.
Seven Questions to Improve Your Business, Your Relationships, and Your Life
Seven Questions to Improve Your Business, Your Relationships, and Your Life One of the most powerful tools we have as humans is our ability to ask questions.  The more adept we are at asking them (and waiting for and listening to the answers), the more effective we will be.
Top 10 Ways Websites Makes Me Suffer
I believe some people create and publish websites for the sole purpose of tormenting their visitors. Browsing various websites and navigating the Web can often be like trying to read on an airplane while a kid kicks the back of your seat and the baby next to you alternates between screaming, crying and drooling on you.
The Top Ten Ways to Stop Procrastinating Now
10. Procrastination Condemnation - Lose the Labels! All those things you call yourself, such as lazy, scattered, disorganized, not good enough, incompetent, or stupid, for example, aren't helping you get things done, are they? You've learned to believe them, and you think they've become something of a self-fulfilling prophecy.
How To Move Your Business Online in 7 Steps
So you have set up your company, fairly established and generating some sort of revenue. Why should you take the most important step of starting online?The online audience is massive - it's an information resource used by millions worldwide and continues to grow.
10 Things To Do When Business Slows Down Over The Holidays
I'm sure you've seen it happen every year: your business slows down during predictable times, like the summer vacation months or year-end holidays. For the self-employed who rely upon steady cash flow, this can be a disconcerting time.
10 Budgeting Tips for Business People and Small Companies
It is possible for small companies and individual business people to cut costs without sacrificing quality. Keep these 10 budgeting tips in mind when purchasing goods and services.
Top Ten Reasons to Write a Sales Letter for Each Product? - Part 1
Authors/publishers are great at getting their books written. Entrepreneurs know their products.
7 Super Ways To Drum Up More Sales
1. Use subheads throughout your ad copy.
The Warning signs of Online Fraud and How To Avoid It
The number may seem grim for Web-based commerce. In 2004 in the Unites States alone, computer users logged in more than 207,000 Internet fraud reports to the U.
7 Tips To Increase The Success Of Your Online Business
1. Outsource what takes you too long to doWhen you don't have time to do something, you either don't do it, or do it faster and make mistakes.
Top Ten Listening Skills for Speakers
Good Speakers need good listening skills to become Great CommunicatorsSpeakers spend a lot of time developing speaking skills and often don't focus enough on the equally important communication skill of listening. As a Speaker trained in the art of listening I have put together the tips below.
10 Reasons to Use Online Banking
With today's technology and people's need for more information it is no wonder that online banking is growing as one of the most popular uses of the internet. Here we have listed the 10 biggest benefits to start using online banking.
7 Reasons You ARE Your Own Best Product, or Lessons From the 2004 Presidential Election
The 2004 election is over--at least in the minds of the public--and analysis runs rampant as to why Senator John Kerry lost. From a business viewpoint, one could say that he simply didn't sell the product.
Ten Tips For Staying Connected While Working Alone
Ten Tips for Staying ConnectedMany of my business clients tell me that what they missed most when they started their businesses was the camaraderie of an office setting. Small businesses often start with the owner as the only employee.

Comments   0