Personal Blogs

My working day is often dominated by email: reading email, writing email, and searching for really important bits of information in email messages that I know that someone has sent to me.

I have a number of different roles. I’m a staff tutor (the main substantive role I hold), a tutor (I do a bit of tutoring on the side, just so I know how to do my main job better), and a student. All messages that relates to each of these roles comes through to the same inbox.

This post is about how I (broadly) manage my email load. I begin by summarising the broad approaches that I apply. This is followed by a summary of how I deal with the email that relates to three of the roles that I have.

Policies

Here are the main email ‘policies’ that I try to apply.

Policy 1: Touch once

Put another way, if you’re constantly opening, reading, and closing an email, only to open, read it, and close it again, you’re not doing it right.

Whenever I open an email, I give myself three main choices: 1) action, 2) file, or 3) delete.

1. Action means immediately responding to whatever the email is about. The argument for this is pretty simple: why open something to then close it, to then re-open it later? If you’re in a position to solve whatever problem an email relates to, just go ahead and do it.
2. If that email is just giving information, you might want to read it, and then file it away in a sensible sounding folder, that you can find a bit later on.
3. If that email is giving information that isn’t going to make a substantial impact on your life (or on the lives of those that you support, or work with), delete it. If it is something that really has no relevance, I even go as far as “shift-deleting” it, which means that it isn’t even moved to a deleted folder. If anyone sense me an update about a building in which I have never heard of, that email is subjected to the “shift-delete” treatment.

There is, of course a bit of nuance in all this. If I’m sent an email that relates to a task that I need to complete, I add that task onto a TODO list (it is actioned; I’ve made a note of it, so I can find a time to properly schedule in that work task), and then it is filed.

Policy 2: Minimum inbox

My ideal is to have no email messages in my inbox. This ideal is, however, unrealistic given how much traffic comes my way. Instead, this ideal drives the one touch policy.

Policy 3: Minimise subscriptions

If you find yourself pressing the delete button too regularly than you feel that you ought to be doing, it might be useful to ask the question: “do I really need this?” If this answer is “no”, and your name has found its way onto an email list, you might want to think about unsubscribing.

Policy 4: Route emails to folders

As well as being a staff tutor, I tutor on two academic modules. One module I tutor has the code TM354, another has the code TM470. I tell my students on these modules to always include the module code in the subject of the emails that they send me, so I can prioritise their messages. I have setup a rule that sends all TM470 emails to a TM470 folder.

There are some emails that I receive regularly. These might be relating to discussion forums that I’m subscribed to, or email lists. I subscribe to an external examiner recruitment mailing list. I get a lot of those, and a lot of them are not really relevant to me. To deal with these, I filter them to a dedicated folder, and review them when I have the time.

Policy 5: Don’t send anything if you’re emotional

It’s never a good idea to send an email when you’re angry. By all means draft an email note, but don’t send it. Review what you have written after having a cup of tea and a sit down.

Policy 6: Decide whether email is the best way to communicate

Even if you write a message whilst in a calm and measured frame of mind, you never know how your message may be received. Do ask the question: is email the best way to share a message?

If you need to communicate something that may have a significant emotional impact, consider using a three stage approach: send an email to schedule a date and time for a telephone call, and then have a telephone call, and follow up with an email summary of your understanding of the call. Checking for shared understandings can be really helpful.

Policy 6: Keep it short

We’re all busy, and we’re often tired. No one likes to be presented with walls of text about procedure or policy. If you need to share detailed information, use an attachment, or provide a link to a know shared area. Your time is important. Keep your emails short.

Policy 7: Choose not to stress

When my inbox gets a bit out of hand, I actively tell myself: “it’s okay; if something is really urgent and needs to be dealt with, someone will give me a ring”. This is, of course, invariably what happens. The challenge with email is that all messages when they land in your inbox look the same (except for those flagged ‘urgent’, but those don’t get used too regularly). Whilst my inbox hardly ever gets to zero, I actively choose not worry about how many emails I have (but this is easier said than done, of course).

Reflections

This is very much my own approach and philosophy. What works for some people doesn’t always work for others. I hope this is useful!

On 18 November 25, I attended a CPD session that had the title Compassionate Communication, facilitated by colleagues from the student communications hub. This was one of a number of professional development sessions that were run on the day for OU tutors.

The aim of the session was to define what was meant by compassionate communication and recognise its relevance, identify common barriers (to communication), and explore ways to overcome those barriers. Looking back after the session, I can see that it had a very specific and practical focus: how to use email effectively.

What follows are some notes (and thoughts) I drew from the session.

Definition

The session opened with a definition of what compassionate communication might be. I noted down the follow words: empathy, mindful (of different circumstances, and how your words come across), timely (each module has module calendar), clear and transparent (communicating clearly and offering explanations) and inclusive (be aware of the challenges that others face, and use of appropriate language).

We were then asked about the potential barriers to compassionate communication. I thought this was a very good question, and noted down the following: time, stress and burnout (of the sender), inaccessible communication style, misinterpretation of communications, and lack of training.

Practice

Moving to another part of the session, we were introduced to a simple exercise which focussed on a simple question: how might an email message make someone feel? We looked at a sample email message that had the aim of building trust, developing a sense of community, and to encourage contact. Another question was, of course, did it do these things? Also, what else could we add to improve it? What does ‘good email communication’ look like?

Here are some key points that I noted down:

• Clear intent and aim.
• Positive and encouraging tone.
• Acknowledgement of the individual.
• Timeliness of the communication.
• Clear setting of expectations.
• Use of plan English with an active voice rather than formal academic English.
• Providing clear sign posting to answers or resources.
• Consider the length of the communication; keep it short.
• Avoid idioms, dismissing concerns or feelings.
• Never include accusatory language (you haven’t done something).
• Do encourage seeking of support and further, mirror language used by the recipient.
• Show empathy.

My points

Thinking about all these points, I would like to add my own, in order of importance:

• If you find yourself writing a very long email with multiple points, consider whether a call would be more useful.
• If you feel you need to build trust or empathy, schedule a call. Email is good for sharing information. It is terrible for understanding the needs of others.
• When using email to book a time to have a call, offer a couple of alternatives, in order of preference. Also state how you would like to make that call. Is it through a plain old telephone system, through a Team video call, or through your Adobe Connect room. Choose what you prefer.
• After a call has taken place, follow up with a short email, offering thanks for their time, also sharing the key points from the conversation.
• When replying to an email, consider where a student is in their studies. Where are they likely to be in the module calendar?
• Consider what previous email communications has taken place previously.
• If your email contains more than one separate points, consider whether you need to send multiple emails. It is sometimes better to separate out issues into separate messages. Doing this allows you to talk about them during a call if you need to.
• If you have to write an email that is sensitive, or contains a lot of information, reflect on whether you need to send it right away. Sometimes it is a good idea to write your message, save it as a draft, and then send it later. Spending time to reflect on what you have written can be helpful.
• Choose a subject line that is helpful.
• Open and close emails in a clear and polite way.
• Avoid using Generative AI. It will just waste your time. You will spend more time reading and rewriting what it produces. Email messages produced using Gen AI tools often sound robotic.

Reflections

I am drawn to sessions about soft skills for a really simple reason: they are really important.

I was expecting something slightly different. I was expecting something about speaking more directly to others, perhaps when using the phone, using videoconferencing software, or speaking during tutorials. I wasn’t expecting it all to be all about email.

Email is a skill. I spend hours a day in my inbox. I’ve received loads of really long emails that contain very many complicated points. Out of all these points I’ve shared here, if I were to share only two of them, they would be: keep it short, and keep it simple.

Acknowledgements

Many thanks to Ellena White and Sara Bradley who facilitated the session. Some of the key points shared in the practice section of the blog have been paraphrased from their slides.