E-mail Housekeeping.

Are you an e-mail chatter box? Do you keep your inbox full rather than empty? Do you suffer from e-mail addiction? Do you know how to give the “e-mail brush-off”?

Did you know that how you manage your inbox says a lot about you? For example, “…if you keep your inbox full rather than empty, it may mean you keep your life cluttered in other ways,” says psychologist Dave Greenfield, who founded the Center for Internet Behavior in West Hartford, Conn.

Often, I would walk by someone’s desk and notice that he or she seemed to have thousands of unanswered e-mails. I can remember feeling inadequate; as in–I’m not important or popular enough to be getting all of that mail.

But then I realized that those with the over-stuffed inbox could be “e-procrastinators”…making the decision to deal with old e-mail tomorrow or the next day…similar to those who leave bills unopened for months and months.

I answer every e-mail — that may have to do with my need to be liked. I also have a very neat in-box…because I can’t bear chaos and clutter. (why then is my sweater drawer in such disarray?)

Regardless of what type of e-mail profile under which we fall, the bottom line is that an organized inbox can only help our productivity.

Here are some logical tips from organizational experts: Marilyn Paul, author of It’s Hard To Make A Difference When You Can’t Find Your Keys, a book for the chronically disorganized, says –

• Pare down an inbox by moving e-mail into folders by need or follow-up
• Once a week, set aside time for inbox housekeeping
• Use the inbox alphabetizing feature, which organizes all e-mail by sender (I’m trying that one immediately)

Christina Cavanaugh, author of Managing Your Email: Thinking Outside The Box (heh, I get it…) says:

• Simply delete the oldest 9,000 notes (9,000! who has that many?)

When you think about it, if you compare your in-box to your kitchen, would you want all of that garbage lying around?

Good luck and sometimes, just say no…and don’t answer your mail.

Material compiled from Wall Street Journal article.