The Problem with Email (1 of 5)
Posted by Abe on October 5, 2015
Abe
Full Stack Engineer
Published on October 5, 2015
Given active trending discussions on email, communication and productivity becoming more and more convoluted with each new app that pops up…we are beginning to see a new shift in information overload. So here are a series of blog shorts on how to pacify our need for control with information and productivity. Welcome to the Mailbird blog series “From Productivity Hole to Productivity Hub”.
In the series of blog shorts we’ll be covering:
1) The problem with email
2) Data on people + email + productivity and email usage
3) What it means to be productive when email is a major part of your job: Get more with less work philosophy
4) Best email practices
5) Why choose an email client?
Let’s start at the beginning with #1 of 5 in this important blog short series.
What’s Most Problematic with Email?
Email is literally the greatest technological advancement made to human communication in the 20th century, and…it still is. However what we see these days are a lot of people complaining about email that it’s too slow, it’s not secure enough, it’s ugly, it doesn’t work for how my team communicates in the work place, it kills my productivity, it’s very distracting, I have too much email, I wish I could check all my email from different accounts in one place, it’s boring and the list goes on. We are almost certain that you have one of the aforementioned email complaints, and if not, your own unique complaints. For something that is a prominent technology used worldwide, this is something that deserves a closer look. A deep investigation into the pursuit of email happiness.
Gina Trapani, blogger for Lifehacker, says it well.
“While I agree that an overstuffed inbox and constant email monitoring can kill your day, this $700 billion a year cost to the American economy makes me raise one eyebrow high in doubt. Did researchers factor in how much time email actually saves people who use it? I get dozens of messages per day and spend a good amount of time managing all of them. I’m the first to complain about what a time sink email can be. However, if I had to get on the phone or mail a letter to Adam, Kevin, Tamar, and Jason every time I wanted to tell them something? Nothing would get done around here.” (http://lifehacker.com/399078/what-productivity-studies-really-show)
You would like to read more on productivity? Check out Part 2, Part 3, Part 4 and Part 5 of our series.
Abe
Full Stack Engineer
Published on October 5, 2015
