Do you have an effective way to process your e-mail so that you keep your Inbox empty on a routine basis? If you receive a lot of e-mail you might want to rethink your methods. Really, it is possible to empty your Inbox!

No doubt you've opened e-mails and thought, "Hmmm, not sure what to do with this. I'll deal with it later!" - and promptly closed the message. If you do this over and over, it doesn't take long to end up with hundreds of messages in your Inbox.

Developing a new approach will help you gain more control, improve your response time and keep up with critical actions and due dates.

4 Key Success Factors

1. A simple and effective e-mail reference system
2. Uninterrupted time to process e-mail
3. A methodical system for processing items
4. The "Four D's for Decision Making" model

Set up a simple and effective system
The first step toward an organised inbox is understanding the difference between reference information and action information.

* Reference information is information that is not required in order to complete an action; it is information that you want to keep in case you need it later.

* Action information is information you must have in order to complete an action. Most people receive a considerable amount of reference information so having a system that enables you to quickly transfer messages from your Inbox into your e-mail reference system is essential.

Schedule Uninterrupted Time
For many of us, every day is a series of interruptions with brief moments of concentration. But it's nearly impossible to complete anything when you allow constant interruptions from the phone, people stopping by your office and instant messaging. Therefore, it is critical that you set aside time to deal with your e-mail.

An excellent practice is to establish a regular time to process your e-mail. Of course, you can scan e-mail during the day for urgent messages or requests from your boss, but many items require you to make a decision. Good decisions require focus, which requires uninterrupted attention. When you do the bulk of your processing during your scheduled time and not randomly throughout the day, you're a lot more able to focus - and therefore make good decisions.

Take a look at your calendar and find a time when you're least likely to be interrupted. Book yourself a recurring appointment for 1 hour a day to process e-mail and mark it as "busy." During this time don't answer the phone or take interruptions and work only on processing your Inbox.

At first, keeping these appointments with yourself will take discipline, but over time the discipline becomes habit. Once you get to zero e-mail in your Inbox, you'll see the value of this 1 hour a day and stick to it like glue.

Process 1 item at a time
When you sit down to process your e-mail, first sort it by the order in which you want to process it. For example, you can filter by date, subject, or person.

Resist the temptation to jump around in your inbox, going from one message to another, opening, closing and occasionally deleting. Instead, begin your processing with the message at the top and only move to the second one after you've handled the first.

The "Four D's for Decision Making" model
The "Four D's for Decision Making" model (4 D's) is a valuable tool for processing e-mail, helping you to quickly decide what action to take with each item and how to remove it from the Inbox.

How many times have you opened, reviewed and closed the same e-mail message over and over? Some of those messages are getting lots of attention but very little action! A better practice is to handle each e-mail only once before taking action — which means making a decision about what to do with it. Under the 4 D's model, you have 4 choices:

1. Delete it
2. Do it
3. Delegate it
4. Defer it

DELETE IT
A large proportion of what you receive can be deleted, but some people shudder when they hear the "delete" word. People are hesitant to delete messages for fear they might need them. That's understandable, but ask yourself honestly: What percentage of information that you've kept do you actually use?

The questions below might help you decide what messages to keep and what to delete.

1. Does it relate to a meaningful objective you're currently working on? If not, delete it.
2. Does it contain information you can find else where (ie: on the web)? If so, delete it.
3. Does it contain information that you will refer to within the next 6 months? If not, delete it.
4. Does the message contain information that you're required to keep (ie: legal or human resources information that relates to your company)? If not, delete it.

DO IT
If you can't delete it you need to answer the questions, "What specific action do I need to take?" and "Can I do it in less than 2 minutes?"

You would be amazed at what you can accomplish in less than 2 minutes. You could file the message, respond to it or make a phone call. Really push yourself to find out what you can actually accomplish in less than 2 minutes. You'll surprise yourself.

DELEGATE IT
If you can't delete it or do it in 2 minutes or less, ask yourself, "Can I delegate it?" . People often forget to ask that question and miss opportunities to delegate actions.

If you can delegate it, do it right away. See if you can compose and send the delegating message in less than 2 minutes. If it takes a bit longer, that's ok. The key is to ask yourself if you can, to ensure you are using your time wisely.

Once you have delegated the action, delete the original message or move it into your e-mail reference system.

DEFER IT
If you cannot delete it, do it in less than 2 minutes, or delegate it, then the action required is something that only you can accomplish and that will take more than 2 minutes. Because this is your dedicated e-mail processing time, you need to defer it.

When you go through your Inbox and delete the items you can eliminate, do the items that can be done in less than 2 minutes and delegate what you can, you end up with only those action items that you need to complete yourself, and that will require more than 2 minutes to complete. At this point, you can prioritize that list and schedule time on your calendar to ensure the priorities get done.

Do it daily
Using the 4 D's model on a daily basis makes it easier to handle a large quantity of e-mail.

Of course, if you have a backlog of hundreds of messages, it will take some time to get to the point where daily routine keeps you up to date. But it's important to reduce that backlog, so set aside time to work through it - then begin using your new technique from a clean slate.

Book yourself 1 hour of e-mail time a day and use the 4 D's. It can transform your Inbox and help create better work-life balance.

This is an edited extract of an article available online by Sally Mcghee, author of Take Back Your Life! Using Microsoft Outlook to Get Organized and Stay Organized. ISBN: 0735622159