I cleaned up my email folders last week. This felt so freeing. Most of us have way too many folders and filters set up in email. If your email has a good search feature like gmail does, you don’t need all the folders. It’s rare you look into the folders unless they are action folders. It’s faster to search "Anne policy" rather than search in the Anne folder for that policy email.
I deleted folders of old projects or people I used to work with ages ago. Instead of having reference folders of all different kinds I have only a few.
My smaller folder list now. (A means action, R is reference):
- 3 Project folders for current projects headed by P for project
- A/Listen to – for audios I want to hear, usually on a break
- A/Waiting For – things I need a response from. I look at it weekly to see if there is anything I need to follow up on
- A/To Read – articles, newsletters, etc. that aren’t urgent. I have newsletters filtered there bypassing my inbox
- A/Action – for anything I need to do once it is on my to do list. Usually only if it will take more than a day to get to it.
- R/Accounting – for all my bookkeeping emails, important for tax season
- R/Clients – I use this to check up on old clients and keep in contact
- R/Registrations – logins and registrations for various sites
- R/Smily – emails that make me smile for when I need a boost
What email folders do you never look into that are cluttering up your email box?
I learned a long time ago I only needed two folders…SENT and DELETED…my co-workers wonder how I put my hands on information so quickly and this is how and why…because I either sent it or I received it and deleted it…I carry this into my personal email and it works great! Sometimes, I have been known to edit the subject line to help locate an email easier if it was a non-descript subject and I thought I might need it later.
Yes Abbeycat, changing the subject line is a great way to find information faster. I do this as well.