The Only Five Email Folders Your Inbox Will Ever Need
Stop “organizing” your emails by subject and start thinking of them in terms of deadlines.
The biggest mistake you can make on email is creating folders based on topics.
Emails, like meetings, rarely stay on track.
The system that saved my sanity requires only five folders:
#1 Inbox
Emails shouldn’t stay here any longer than it takes for you to file them into another folder.
The exception to this rule is when you respond immediately and are waiting for an immediate response.
#2 Today
Everything that requires a response today.
#3 This Week
Everything that requires a response before the end of the week.
#4 This Month/Quarter
Everything that needs a longer-term response. Depending on your role, you may need a monthly folder. Others can operate on a quarterly basis.
#5 FYI
Most items I receive are informational. If I think I may need to reference an email again, I’ll save it to this folder.
If your work is project-based, you can create this five-folder system for each project.
You may have two or three projects running at a time, and technically wind up with 10 to 15 total folders as a result–but the system still holds.
After the project is complete, archive the entire structure.