Free What To Do When There's Too Much To Do by Laura Stack Page B

seeing only the e-mails you need to see, on the day you need to see them. More information for dating e-mails is given below.
    5. File the e-mail in a personal folder. Alternatively, some people like to do a File, Save As, and save the e-mail as an .msg file (Outlook message format) on a hard or shared drive (in the same way you would a Word document or PowerPoint deck).
    6. Unsubscribe, create a Rule, or add the sender to the blocked senders list. If you change your mind, you can always select “Not Junk” to trust e-mail from that source, and it will move it back into your Inbox.
    So let’s discuss some different options for Step 4, dating an e-mail. You have several choices.
    Convert the e-mail to a Task. 21 In Outlook, you can right-click on a message and choose the option to “Move to Folder.” Or, if you opened the e-mail, look for the “Move to Folder” button. Or, if you’re an icon person, it’s the one that looks like a piece of paper with an arrow into a folder. Personally, I like to right-click, as this presents me with a context-sensitive menu. Outlook presents you with a dialog box, asking which folder you’d like to move the item into. If it’s something you need to
do
, select Tasks. If it’s connected to a specific
time
, for example a lunch date, then select Calendar. Don’t put things youneed to do in your calendar, because if you don’t get it done, you have to manually change the date to another day. Tasks, however, roll forward automatically. A new Task or Appointment will be automatically created, and your e-mail with attachments will be included in the text portion. In the Task, fill in the Start Date, which is the date you want to
see
the item again. The Due Date is when you must
complete
the item. Set a Start Date, because if something is due on the 30th, it won’t help you to see it on the 30th if it will take several days to complete it. You need to see it when you have to
begin
the task. Unfortunately, Outlook is set to have the To-Do bar display the “Today” flag by Due Date, so you have to change it to arrange by “Start Date.” It doesn’t matter when it’s due; it matters only that you see it again in enough time to complete it before it’s due!
    Note: It’s important to use the “Move to Folder” command (and select Tasks or Calendar) rather than just dragging and dropping an e-mail. If you just drag an e-mail to Tasks, it will create a
copy
of the e-mail from your Inbox, and the attachments don’t go with it. Later, you’d have to waste time locating it so you can respond to the original e-mail. Using the “Move to Folder, Tasks” feature, you can open the e-mail from inside the Task itself and reply. You have to get out of the mindset that an e-mail has to be in the inbox in order to reply to it.
    Print the e-mail and file in your tickler file. Some people are still paper people and like to print e-mails. If you must print yours, file it in your paper tickler file, and move the e-mail to a personal folder called “@Tickler,” so you know where to locate it when it comes up in your tickler file. That way, your Inbox contains unprocessed work, and your @Tickler contains only processed work, triggered by date in your Tickler.
    Create reminders from Sent Items. Perhaps you want to receive a reminder on an e-mail you sent, to confirm that yourrequest was completed, or that you received the answer you needed, etc. Click on your Sent Items and find the message you just sent. Drag that e-mail to Tasks (thus creating a copy, so it doesn’t move out of your Sent Items). Click the Reminder box and set a date you expect to hear back. (Don’t set a Start Date or Due Date, so it doesn’t show up in your To-Do bar.) When you get the Reminder pop-up box, you can open each one and review. If you received a reply, mark it complete or delete it. If you haven’t heard