The majority of us are on information overload. We are constantly
inundated with emails, news, texts, articles, feeds, tweets, blogs, calls,
reminders and much more, not only in our professional lives but our personal
lives as well. Digital storage space is much less expensive than ever before.
Regular folks, in addition to companies, are contributing online content, which
has multiplied the amount of content being generated. Our tech tools do much
more than ever before, and mobile professionals are “on call” for working 24/7.
It can be extremely overwhelming!
To take control, it is important that we address these 5 different
challenges:
- We must capture and cull
together all the relevant bits of information.
- We must organize
those contents, grouping like with like and, hopefully, indexing the details
for later searching.
- We must make sure we
have enough space to adequately store and manage the contents being retained,
not worrying if we’ll go over imposed limits.
- We must address privacy
concerns by verifying what we keep is stored safe from theft, loss or damage.
- We must plan for
quickly locating what’s needed later so we see the contents in an
understandable way, being able to share what’s needed.
In addressing the immense challenges of surviving today’s info
avalanche, there are action items we can implement immediately. For busy
professionals to wade through all the information with which we’re bombarded,
the first step is to turn off all the
pings and dings of our various notifications; this empowers us to be in
control of when we handle information, not whoever is sending that information
out in our direction. Then, it’s important for us to be very clear about our personal and professional goals so we’ll know
upfront how we’d like to use whatever useful information we receive, which
will allow for a much clearer focus in on what information is applicable,
thereby blocking out what is really not needed. Such tweaks to how we address
the info avalanche can make an immediate and noticeable difference in how we
survive.
When evaluating the info avalanche and how we can best handle it, email
is a place where we can get overwhelmed until it’s all a blur; however, there
are tons of great techniques for clearing the clutter in our email. First, send fewer emails to get fewer
emails back. Obviously, if you need something documented, you’ll need to
stick with sending an email, and, if you need to send the information to
multiple people at once, email is the best option; however, if a phone call
will suffice, give that a try. Next, unsubscribe from eNewsletters you are
not reading. While it only takes a second to hit the delete key, those
seconds add up if you are continuing to delete the same eNewsletter regularly;
instead, take a little extra time upfront to unsubscribe so you save the
accumulating time of deleting with each receipt. On the other hand, consider
culling those subscriptions you do want to keep receiving into a “roll-up”
by using Unroll.me’s website or The Swizzle’s email tool. Third, master the
art of creating reference folders within your email management tool. You
can more quickly locate a message for later reference when you have enough
folders that everything to be kept can have a home while you limit the number
of fodders so nothing could be appropriate for more than one of those existing.
Within your reference folders, utilize automated rules to sort emails into
their appropriate homes, whether to highlight what needs time-sensitive
attention or to cull items for reading when convenient for you. Finally and
probably most importantly, shift your mentality related to email from
“checking” your email to “processing” it so your Inbox is no longer a
holding zone, you don’t repeat time and effort of reading any original message and
what you’ll reply doesn’t weigh on you continually between receipt and finally
responding. Tasks that take
less than 5 minutes should be completed with the message asking for them to be
done is initially received. Any task that will take longer than 5 minutes to do
needs to be added to your running tasks list. Appointments should be moved to your calendar, retention items should be moved to
your personal folders and anything not needed should be moved directly to Trash.
When processing and maintaining your email account, please remember the “delete” key can be your friend. There’s
no need to hold onto whatever is no longer accurate, applicable, useful or
bringing you joy. Likewise, there is a big difference between junk that you
should never bring into your space to begin with and trash that you can delete
after reviewing. Most importantly, though, when determining what to save,
ignore or delete, consider what can be easily located online later. There’s
no need to clutter your space with what you don’t need or can just as easily
get online.
Further, even though much of the daily overwhelm comes from electronic,
paper can be a problem, too. To clear the clutter with regards to paper, we
must first acknowledge that it’s
easier to find what’s needed in electronic form; therefore, convert what
paper you can to electronic files. There are such powerful scanning options
from Doxie, Fujitsu and Neat, but many folks simply take a photo of the paper
to be converted to electronic using their phones so it’s important to keep in
mind how many options can turn paper to electronic. Beyond that, as with email,
consolidate what paper comes into your space via an Inbox, empowering
you to address what’s most important when convenient for you. Create naming
conventions to mirror between paper and electronic and, then, schedule time
regularly to edit the contents of your retention files. When any piece of
paper is no longer accurate, applicable, useful or bringing you joy, get it out
of your space, whether via recycling or shredding. Finally, utilize a
fireproof safe for those most important papers, especially what needs to be
accessed quickly in the event you die or are incapacitated.
There are excellent tools currently
available for our mobile devices to aid in easily storing what information we
will need later without it turning into another form of clutter. Using MorningCoffee for Android or Firefox, Morning for iOS or Flipboard that works across
the various platforms, you can determine which communication or news channels
cross into your space. Then, you can more easily save what will be needed later
into a “Read It Later” app, like Pocket, Instapaper and Readability. Likewise,
for any blog or website that posts content in a stream, you can pull its RSS
feed into an RSS Reader, like Feedly, FeedReader, NewsBlur, and RSSOwl. While Pinterest has been pigeon-holed into being just for
planning DIY projects, pulling fashion ideas or planning your home renovation,
Pinterest can be a great tool for storing the information facing us daily,
allowing you to create an image board for any project or client. Alternatively,
Twitter can be a great tool for storing the information onslaught we get with
sweet Tweets, making them easier to locate again later. Lastly, lest we not
forget my all-time favorite tool for storing information that we’ll need later
without creating another form of clutter, I recommend a self-made database in
Evernote, to which you can send emails so each is better retained for later. See which best meets your needs and enhances
your toolbox.
Meanwhile, although
there are tons of useful apps to boost your productivity and enable sharing
information with your team, you don’t have to log into each individually each
day; many of these tools talk to one another so you can get information from
several of these tools by logging into just one app. You can cull together
documents from various online file repositories with CloudCube on Android and
Citrix ShareFile QuickEdit on iOS. Quip Business lets a team combine shared
documents with messaging about related projects, all in one place. Further,
both Catch App and Hojoki App merge data from multiple different apps for
quicker response and easier understanding of all that’s happening. As your team
grows and evolves, always be thinking about how tech tools can help you be more
efficient.
Streamlining can be vital in clearing the clutter, and there are two other tools I’d
like to bring to your attention to aid in your attempts at streamlining the
info avalanche. First, although it’s important to have the right message in
front of the right audience at the right time to grow your business, you can’t
be everywhere at once, which makes a social media manager very valuable.
Options include Buffer, Hootsuite, Postling, SocialOomph and Sprout, but find
the one that best meets your unique needs and test it before committing.
Second, since our brains are meant for thinking, not remembering, a
Customer Relationship Manager helps remember the details of previous
interactions as well as when each contact needs follow-up. I recommend
looking at Infusionsoft, Insightly, NetVibes, Nimble and Zoho.
As many people
claim that one is a lonely number, I’ve found it to be very powerful for
boosting folks’ productivity. In my work with individuals and corporate
teams, I’m continually reminded that each of us is just one person, not a work
person and home person. With that in mind, these are 5 tools I’ve
found to be most helpful when you use just one for all segments of your life:
- One calendar for both work and personal items encourages you to
not double-book yourself and leads to fewer items falling through the cracks.
- One running tasks list that funnels into one daily to-do list
for each day means you more easily know what needs to be done at each moment and
allows you to better focus on the 3 to 5 action items most important for your
current day.
- One “data dump” that enables your brain to think, rather than
remember details, allows you to search just one location for all your notes, research
and references.
- One address book for both work and personal contacts empowers
you to better maintain contacts’ most current information.
- One weekly strategy session that is supported with one wrap-up each
day allows you to have a game plan for attacking what absolutely must be
done each week as well as those important items that are not urgent.
On a related note,
though I do believe work / life integration is replacing the impractical concept
of work / life balance, I also feel it is vital for busy professionals to
set limits on our availability to customers, vendors and other team members.
There’s
no right or wrong answer about how accessible you should be, but it’s important
to set guidelines based on what works best for you and the unique needs of your
business. Tools and software can mesh with the way you need to communicate day
to day, but it’s also smart to step away for a while from time to time. Whether
you are an introvert or an extrovert, it’s important to incorporate downtime
into your routine and to disengage from electronic communications by building
some much-needed quiet into your day. This can be for reflection, for
progressing towards goals, for re-energizing or whatever meets your needs, but
its value is beyond measure.
Even though it might seem impossible, you can certainly survive the
information avalanche in today’s society, but you must be focused in your
efforts and fully utilize the available tools to help you. Click here to view a
recent interview of me addressing this topic with Julie Coraccio of Reawaken
Your Brilliance, and think about how these tools and techniques can apply to
your specific needs. Don’t hesitate to ask for help and keep evolving as the available
tech tools continue to develop around you do.
What tools and
techniques do you employ in surviving the info avalanche?
