Countless surveys, reports, and studies are showing that employee burnout is continuously on the rise.
Thank you, Captain Obvious, right?
I bet you don’t need any studies or surveys to tell you that one.
But in case you weren’t aware of recent findings, here are a few stats to know…
#1 – According to a Gallup-Workhuman report conducted in 2022, “25% of employees describe being burned out at work ‘very often’ or ‘always’—meaning that, for a quarter of the workforce, energy, motivation and productivity are declining.”1
#2 – 34% of respondents in MetLife’s U.S. Employee Benefit Trends Study reported feeling burned out. According to Todd Katz, executive vice president and head of group benefits at MetLife, “People are saying they’re less productive, less engaged, that they don’t feel as successful.” 2
#3 – And a survey conducted by Wakefield Research for email platform, Superhuman, found that 38% or workers said that email fatigue is likely to push them to quit their jobs. For employees age 40 and under, “51% listed the volume of emails and Slack or Teams messages they received as a top reason for why they’d consider leaving their jobs.” 3
Clearly, one of the major causes of employee burnout is EMAIL, so you’ll find no shortage of email advice out there to try to help those who seek a solution.
But a lot of that advice is useless and it misses the mark completely as a solution. Sadly, I keep seeing the SAME bad advice over and over again—and none of it is going to help you.
Which bits of advice are they?
There are so many, but today, I’ve chosen one big myth to bust and why, if you follow the advice, it will fail you.
Here it is: OHIO Works for Managing Email
If you don’t recall, OHIO stands for “Only Handle It Once.” A similar “touch it once” or “single-touch” approach is the 4D method: delete it, do it, delegate it or defer it.
All of these methods are unhelpful, unrealistic and ridiculous.
I saw the ‘OHIO’ recommendation as part of some advice given by a Harvard expert who said that the best way to manage email is to just let it accumulate. He encouraged using the 80/20 Rule on e-mail, saying you can ignore 80% of emails.
Wait… what?
Yep… he said for 80% of those emails, just don’t read or respond to them.
Why let 80% of your email accumulate and clog up your Inbox, making it THAT much harder for you to find what you DO need to find? You just made your search for the good stuff 80% harder.
He says ignore your email. I say, ignore that advice.
If you’re going to ignore 80% of your email—and you’ve looked at it to verify that you can ignore it—then DELETE it! Why are you holding on to it? Get rid of it. Or archive it if you have to follow legal rules for Records Retention.
The Harvard expert goes on to say that for the remaining 20% of your email, he recommends using the “OHIO” approach.
But the OHIO approach is completely unreasonable for managing the action steps and follow-ups that come from emails.
Only ONE of the ‘OHIO,’ ‘single touch’ or 4D choices is easy: delete. You can always do that. Although, as evidenced by the “expert” advice above, you’re supposed to let it accumulate, so maybe deleting isn’t so easy for some. After all, even deleting requires a decision.
And the others: delegate, do or defer?
Here’s where the advice is going to fail you…
1 – If you DELEGATE it, how will you keep track of the progress?
Not all team mates are on top of their game, so you have to be careful what you let go of—especially if YOU are ultimately responsible for completion.
2 – If you DO it, are you sure it’s the priority right now?
Or are you just handling that email because it’s the next email in the Inbox?
And are you “going down the rabbit hole” every time you try to DO the action steps or follow-ups that come from emails? If so, that means…
…you never know how long that’s going to take
…you don’t know how many new paths you’ll have to follow
…you don’t know what road blocks you’ll hit—or how many
…you have no way to track how far you got
…you may have to abandon the task, close the email and come back to it another time
When you try to DO everything that an email brings you, you will have spent SO much time going down rabbit holes that you never finish reading all of your emails and now you’re back where you started.
You’re definitely not ahead and you may even be farther behind as a result.
3 – If you want to DEFER it, what system are you using to plan action, prioritize it against ALL of your other tasks, and take action at the right time?
No system? OK, then are you flagging it? Marking it as unread so it stays bold in the Inbox? Printing it and putting it on your desk for later?
These emails will only accumulate and make it harder for you to follow up, and all you end up doing is wasting a lot of time later on revisiting and re-addressing those emails.
You’re re-reading emails you’ve already seen, but couldn’t do anything with.
In the process, you can also…
…lose track of details and notes, which invites mistakes and oversights
…backtrack the wrong way or repeat steps you’ve already taken
…hit the same road blocks again if you’re not keeping track of notes and next action steps
The bottom line is this: you can’t just knock out every email as it comes in, like hitting baseballs endlessly from a pitching machine.
That’s where the OHIO, ‘single-touch’ or ‘touch it once’ advice is going to fail you.
You’re just working on one email after another—whether it’s a priority or not—and expecting to touch it ONLY once. That’s nonsense.
Here’s the truth…
Deleting and filing emails is easy, but if you have emails containing TASKS and FOLLOW-UPS, you’ll likely touch those MANY times during the course of taking action steps and moving things forward.
To do that, you have to have the right system in place to manage it—one that handles tasks AND emails AND information.
Without a system or a process to manage tasks, email and information, you’re left tearing your hair out.
The biggest problems and frustrations appear when managing email because there are 4 BIG GAPS…
GAP #1 – No system for managing tasks
GAP #2 – No systems for storing various types of reference information
GAP #3 – No system for managing email
GAP #4 – No process to follow for email review and decision making
This is why everyone gets so frustrated.
But NOT managing email is NOT an option.That’s like NOT managing phone calls or the letters you receive. These forms of communication are part of your workday, like it or not. Email just happens to be the toughest one to manage because the volume is so high.
But manage email we must. It’s part of the job. And it’s time to learn how to master it.
Don’t think of it as managing the communication tool itself. It’s what’s INSIDE that matters the most.
You must learn how to manage the INFORMATION and TASKS from ALL forms of communication—email included.
#1 – First, make DECISIONS about what you’re getting. The information INSIDE is what needs to be managed.
What does the information REPRESENT? How it is USEFUL to you? What’s the meaning for you?
Is there an event to go to? A task or follow-up step? Is there useful contact information in here? Is there an attachment to save?
What do you need to do? What’s your next step now that you’ve received this email?
These are the questions to ask.
#2 – Next, the emails, the information or the tasks need to be moved OUT of the Inbox, because NONE of those emails are best managed while they’re STILL sitting in the Inbox.
Whether for reference or action, DO something with the email and get it OUT of the Inbox and into the systems that are MEANT for managing THAT type of information, whatever it is.
Once you get to zero, you’ll feel a weight lifted from your shoulders and the stress drop away.
With an empty Inbox—and the relief of knowing you can do that EVERY day—you’ll know that you have SEEN every email, you’ve made a decision about every email, and you’ve moved each and every email—or the information or tasks within—to BETTER locations of either reference or action, or it’s gone—archived or deleted.
And that’s not a myth. That’s a reality. And it’s one that’s possible for YOU.
But if you don’t have a system to manage tasks, that’s the first GAP to address.
Fortunately, it’s all explained in this training I did, where I share exactly what’s happening in the typical workday, what’s not working, and why your day might be wearing you out. If you follow along, I’ll walk you through the exact strategies I teach my clients that will help you stay on track and I’ll explain the essential connection between managing tasks and managing email.
Without a way to manage tasks, you’ll NEVER be able to efficiently or effectively manage email, which means more hair pulling, unfortunately.
But you don’t have to put up with that. Get the answers today: https://productiveday.com/registration.
1 – Forbes, Bryan Robinson, Ph.D., Contributor, “Symptoms of Job Burnout And 7 Steps to Recovery,” July 4, 2022
2 – Forbes, Caroline Castrillon, Contributor, “How to manage Email Overload at Work,” April 25, 2021
3 – Forbes, Edward Segal, Senior Contributor, “Survey Finds Email Fatigue Could Lead 38% of Workers to Quit Their Jobs,” April 21, 2021
