Does this problem sound familiar? You get a huge amount of email every day, and you’re really good at sorting it. You diligently delete anything you don’t absolutely have to respond to, and you prioritize the stuff you do. In fact, you’re actually pretty good at email. But, somehow, you still feel like you spend way more time answering it than you should.
Maybe you just need to get tougher. That’s the attitude of sentenc.es, a site that advocates cutting off your email replies at 2 to 5 sentences per message, depending on how spartan you want to be about it. This can seem a bit extreme at first, but it’s got a lot of advantages.
Just as Twitter’s 140-character limit forces users to provide more content in a smaller space, putting your own sentenc.es policy in place challenges you to cut the fluff from your email so it will fit within your self-imposed limit. Writing shorter emails doesn’t just save time, it also gives you a chance to practice stronger, more concise writing. You’re also not shortchanging the people you’re writing to, especially if they’re as busy as you are. Sending shorter messages means you’re giving other people less to read.
The biggest worry in making a rule like this is that you might come off as a jerk. Sure, the idea of treating email like a text message instead of as a letter seems a bit rude at first, but email has become far less personal over the years, as the volume of spam and notifications from online services has multiplied. Limiting yourself to a few sentences doesn’t mean you have to be impolite or overly formal. Use email to get the essential information across, and follow up over the phone or in person when you need to. You could even write a few more letters by hand in the time you’ll save.
Above all, just remember that rules are made to be broken. If you’re really struggling to fit a message into your self-imposed guidelines, you might save more time by letting it run over. Really, when you have that much to explain, it might be better done in a phone call.
Jay is a freelance writer based in Seattle, WA. He blogs about software for Download Squad, and contributes interviews to Geek Monthly magazine, among others. You can also find him on Twitter.
Photo Credit – HB Art
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