I've recently come across the article "What gets measured gets managed" - http://www.sebastianmarshall.com/?p=202 - and while it's mostly trite, I decided to put it into action to avoid having to declare email bankruptcy. I had over 1500 emails in my various inboxes, and 20 inboxes that were remnants of previous, abandoned attempts to get organised.
So I wrote a script to count the outstanding emails and display the total number as a function of time. (This is also related to http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1933523 )
I've been watching the number steadily go down - I'm now down to about 300 outstanding emails, and feeling pretty good about it. I'm catching up with lost friends, tidying away loose ends, and generally feel like I'm getting a grip on things.
On the way I found a reference to this PG essay, and I thought that if the dup detector let me, I'd share it.
We can't all put it all into action, but we can try, dammit.
So I wrote a script to count the outstanding emails and display the total number as a function of time. (This is also related to http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1933523 )
I've been watching the number steadily go down - I'm now down to about 300 outstanding emails, and feeling pretty good about it. I'm catching up with lost friends, tidying away loose ends, and generally feel like I'm getting a grip on things.
On the way I found a reference to this PG essay, and I thought that if the dup detector let me, I'd share it.
We can't all put it all into action, but we can try, dammit.