Are you returning to work after a holiday break? Are you looking forward to the backlog waiting for you? Didn't think so. This week’s podcast is all about handling overflowing inboxes. 

 

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Script

Episode 111

Hello and welcome to episode 111 of the Working With Podcast. A podcast to answer all your questions about productivity, time management, self-development and goal planning. My name is Carl Pullein and I am your host for this show.

This week’s question is a timely one for all of you returning back to work following the holidays. I know what it’s like having to catch up and deal with the backlog and try to get back into work when you can’t remember where you were when you left for the holidays. 

Now before we get into this week’s question, if you haven’t discovered yet, I am doing a huge Black Friday / Cyber Monday sale on my courses, coaching programmes and books. You can save yourself up to 40% and get yourself a programme or course that could be the stimulus to change things for you so you become better organised and more productive as well as being able to put in place a system that will drive you towards completing your goals and life’s vision. 

I’ve tried very hard this year to make these prices as low as possible because I want to be able to help as many of you as I can discover the amazing benefits of having a fantastic system in place that works for you and helps you to reduce stress and overwhelm so you can spend more of your time doing the things you love doing. That’s what it’s all about really. Helping you to do more of the things you enjoy doing without having to worry about anything else because you have it under control.

So check out my offers and see if there’s something there for you. I am here to help you in whatever way I can. 

Okay, it’s now time for me to hand you over to the mystery podcast voice for this week’s question

This week’s question comes from Jane. Jane asks: Hi Carl do you have any tips and tricks for getting back to work after the holidays? Every year I come back to a mess and I really don’t want that to happen again this year. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. 

Thank you, Jane, for the question and I guess a lot of you are returning to work today after the Thanksgiving holiday. For many of you working only with US clients and customers, you should be okay. For others who have customers, suppliers and clients all over the world your return to work will mean a big backlog to deal with. 

Let’s deal with email first. This is the one that causes most problems after being away for holidays or business trips. Even though most people have been on holiday, your inboxes will still have been filling up. It’s likely you will return to work and could easily spend all day dealing with your email. Not the most productive way to start back. 

Now, before we go any further whatever you do do not “snooze” email. That's the silliest thing you could do. You’ve already seen the email, you know it’s coming back but now there’s little you can do with it until it does come back. You need control, so if you cannot make a decision about something right now, move it to an Action Required folder (or as I have an “action today” folder). This way, you retain control over what’s coming in and what’s going out. When you use features like snooze, all you’ve done is delayed the inevitable. You will have to make a decision about the email sooner or later. Sooner is always better than later. 

Keep in mind pretty much everyone is going to return to work with overflowing inboxes and most of those people will spend all morning, if not all day, dealing with it. This means there’s