Coming back from vacation, even if it is just a few days away from the office, is always a whirlwind. There's email to catch up on, new projects to tackle, and meetings to schedule. Sometimes it feels as though you have to work twice as long just to get back in the swing of things.
While I’m all for unplugging and truly getting away, sometimes it helps if you can do basic email processes while you’re away. Even though I was in the middle of nowhere, without cellphone service each day, I made a point to skim through my email each night.
When processing email, I subscribe to the do, delegate, delete, delay methodology. While on vacation, I focus on delegating, deleting, and delaying. If someone back in the office can help in my absence, I forward emails accordingly and get the original email out of my inbox. Having a team you can count is key to effectively delegating while you are on vacation.
Then, any emails that don’t require an action, I either delete or retain (outside of my inbox) for future reference. The key here is to minimize the number of emails in your inbox when you return from vacation.
If you have a task management system that is easy to access from your mobile device, add any action items to your task management system and file the email away for future reference outside of your inbox. Let your task system remind you to tackle that when you get back to the office.
You might still come back to plenty of emails, but hopefully not the hundreds you might have otherwise had.
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