In every episode of the Weightless Productivity Podcast, we mention surgical responsiveness. So, what is it? In this episode we'll dive further into what it means to be surgically responsive. It's much different from being immediately responsive, and has a lot more to do with intentionality and reliability. We'll talk about being immediately respon…

In previous episodes we've discussed processing email into an Archive folder. When the time comes to do that processing, we want to move through it at a rapid pace, quickly scanning and clearing anything from the inbox that doesn't require a response, or the creation of an action item. When we have items that we've read and want to keep, but that d…

Getting to Inbox Zero once a day can be a fantastic goal in achieving digital serenity, because it ensures that we get through even the most difficult emails that tend to sit at the bottom of the inbox, causing procrastination. It can also lead to mismanaging priorities, allowing others to dictate urgencies, and creating unnecessary back-and-forth …

So many productivity resources assume that we need to set aside time to "respond" to our email, but words matter! Even replacing that word "respond" in our minds with "process" can drastically change the way we go about sitting down to extract action items and file our email in ways that reduces clutter, keeps us at inbox zero, aligns our actions w…

It's rare that we'll give you a pass to create any folders other than the Archive and Chatter Box, because we know that it automatically creates more sorting time, and reduces efficiency. In this case, creating a Follow Up folder for those non-critical follow-ups that may need some attention from time to time, but that are not bound by strict deadl…

Every time we read an email, we're drawn back into that "vortex" of the inbox. It's not just about the time it takes to read one email, it's the fact that when we do it, we tend to read more than one. Before we know it, we've been distracted from our most important priorities again, and we're letting anyone with our email address control our focus.…

So many of us inadvertently use our inboxes as to do lists. We let emails pile up there, and those emails dictate what we should do next. There's so much wrong with this approach: We allow others to dictate our priorities this way, we have to re-read emails to remember what we were supposed to do with them, and worst of all, we procrastinate by doi…

In this episode we're going to create just one rule that will filter out all of the important email you receive, and let only the most important email messages come into your inbox. It's called the "Chatter Box," and we'll explain how to set it up, and why it's so important. Though most of the advice you'll find in the Weightless Productivity podca…

It may feel productive when we're processing email and responding, but often it can create a never-ending cycle that causes more back-and-forth activity. In this episode, we'll talk about how sending more email can cause you to receive more email, and why it's so important to be judicious about what you send, how much you send, and how you write wh…

It's very common to think you need to sort each email you receive into a series of folders you've created, but have you thought about how much time that takes? This tendency to sort email can seem like it would make messages easier to find later, but it often results in an unsorted pile in the inbox that we never get to. Yet, we have powerful searc…

Every single notification, ding, bell, whistle, and alert can draw our attention out of our most important priorities and right back into the "vortex" of the email inbox. In this episode we'll discuss the importance of turning off those notifications in order to stay focused on what matters, and not get drawn back into the Vortex. We'll talk about …

In order to understand the "Email Problem," we need to delve into its origin. How did we get to a place where everyone we know seems to have an overflowing inbox, with thousands of unread messages and a backlog that feels like it will take the next three weekends to clear? Why can't we seem to handle this? Before we try again and again to dig out o…

Weightless Productivity Podcast Episode 001: Introduction and overview. Email is a significant problem, not because of the technology itself, but because of how we use it. The solution isn't found in complex software, but in a change of behavior and a structured approach. By understanding the nature of the email problem, employing behavioral techni…