Fridays go from casual to e-mail-free
On Friday about 150 engineers at chipmaker Intel will kick off "Zero E-mail Fridays." E-mail isn't forbidden, but everyone is encouraged to phone or meet face-to-face. The goal is more direct, free-flowing communication and better exchange of ideas, Intel Principal Engineer Nathan Zeldes says in a company blog post.
E-mail-free Fridays already are the norm at cell carrier U.S. Cellular and at order-processing firm PBD Worldwide Fulfillment Services in Alpharetta, Ga.
Prominent techies are tackling the problem individually by declaring "e-mail bankruptcy" - deleting or archiving an entire in-box and starting over. Among them: prominent tech bloggers Jeff Nolan, Michael Arrington and Vanessa Fox, and venture capitalist Fred Wilson.
E-mail overload is caused by the sheer volume of messages zipping around the globe. Each day, about 39.7 billion person-to-person e-mails, 17.1 billion automated alerts, and 40.5 billion pieces of spam (unsolicited commercial e-mail) are sent worldwide, says researcher IDC. White-collar workers often receive 140 messages a day, says executive coach Marsha Egan.
E-mail can be a useful communications tool, and people who write a lot of it are more likely to receive it, says IDC tech analyst Mark Levitt. But it can quickly get out of hand.
"I didn't even have time to figure out where to start," says Edward O'Connor, a Web developer from San Diego who declared e-mail bankruptcy two weeks ago. O'Connor had about 750 messages dating back three years, almost all of which needed a reply. "I was completely overwhelmed," he says.
Egan says even the busiest e-mailers can, with care, keep control of their in-boxes. Her tips:
- Don't use e-mail to avoid unpleasant tasks. "I couldn't believe people who had never talked to each other but worked in the same office," says Scott Dockter, CEO of PBD. Dockter started e-mail-free Fridays about a year-and-a-half ago. Since then, the number of messages his 400 employees send has dropped by about 75 percent.
- Don't constantly check for new messages. It can take four minutes to re-focus on work after checking an e-mail, Egan says. Jay Ellison, chief operating officer of U.S. Cellular, estimates that his 7,000 employees spend about one and one-half hours a day on their in-boxes. E-mail-free Fridays give them more time to solve customers' problems, he says.
- Respond to important messages first - even if they're difficult. Less-pressing issues can wait until a free moment, Egan says.
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