Why e-mail filters suck

Some Inbox Zero beginners tend to auto-filter mails out of their inbox into a set of sub-folders. But this is not processing but complicating e-mail.

Superficial advantages and their real world disadvantages

  • An empty inbox, because mails are moved into sub-folders
    Your inbox is empty, but you have to check several folders to be up-to-date. You can’t just focus on one project/area at a time, because this is not processing of mails but using your email client as a task manager. E-mail clients are not capable to show you tasks which are due or can be done at a given time or available timeframe.
  • Project/area based folders to focus on one at a time
    When you “working” on mails based on a project/area base, you don’t work in contexts. This system can’t tell you, what also can be done while you are in a context. Real task managers show you, what you can do in your current context. It is far more useful to avoid switching contexts, because it’s just time consuming.
    (A context is a setting in which an event takes place, e. g. home, office, phone or with a special person)
  • Having all related mails in one place
    You simply can’t automate to group all related mails. So you have to reorder mails, which consumes time. But how many times do you really have to have all related mails in one view? Is the management time really worth the matter? Why don’t you just “search” for mails? This effort only accrues when needed and takes less time than drag and drop several mails all the time.

E-mail filters are useful to auto-delete mails e. g. newsletters or social network notifications, that’s it.

veröffentlicht am 03.01.2011 um 21:34 von Martin Labuschin in , ,

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