County & Municipal Legal Services, LLC

In the first post in our “Organizing Your State’s County Bar” series, we took a look at four different kinds of tools that attorneys can use to organize a state’s county and/or municipal attorneys as a group: Google Groups (and its Yahoo! counterpart, Yahoo! Groups), Basecamp, blogs, and wikis. Here we’re going to discuss email management — how to tame the dreaded inbox beast.

In the last several months, I’ve experienced a couple of attempts of attorney groups to get organized along the lines discussed in the prior post. I admit I was surprised at some of the responses. While most lawyers saw the value in the lists/groups, more than a few emailed back with requests to be removed from the list.

It confused me, until I realized what was behind the response: overwhelm. In an age where well-known lawyers & journalists and even tech bloggers are declaring email bankruptcy, it should come as no surprise, really, that attorneys (who also deal with incoming notices from CM/ECF if they practice in federal court) are also feeling the pinch of overloaded email inboxes.

I believe it’s at least partially due to two main factors: (1) failure to proactively manage email, and (2) inability to divorce one’s self from a feeling of moral obligation with respect to email. A few words about each:

Proactive Management

In far too many cases, we’re letting our inboxes manage us, instead of the other way around. Email, whether at a desktop computer or via the ubiquitous Blackberry or smart phone, simply “is” — much like many things in our work lives. We don’t question it, or how we approach it either individually or organizationally. We simply let it exist as is, and we conform ourselves around its (seeming) demands.

Moral Obligation

The second, and in my book far more insidious, factor behind email overwhelm is the sense of moral obligation it evokes in many. It’s the same impulse that’s behind our strange decision to answer the telephone during dinner, or our mad rush to get to the door before whoever is ringing the bell gets away. We feel compelled to pay attention right then and to respond right there — not necessarily for any intrinsic value that the communication’s underlying meaning holds for us, but simply because someone else picked up the phone and called.

Nine Steps to Taming the Email Beast

These steps are designed to address both of those factors — to help you implement proactive management processes and to help quell any residual sense of moral obligation, or at least to put it in its proper perspective.

You certainly don’t need to try them all at once, but do give each a thorough test, and keep an open mind. These steps help create a whole new way of looking at email for many, and to that extent it might feel weird, alien, or just plain rude. But my experience has been overwhelmingly positive in my own implementation of these steps.

Here’s a quick listing of each rule, then below, I’ll discuss each in more detail.

1. Get a Gmail account for all non-urgent professional & social email..
2. Create strong, descriptive labels in your Gmail settings, or a strong folder architecture in your email client, for each account.
3. Delete nothing. Ever.
4. Turn off ALL auto-alerts to incoming emails.
5. Establish set-in-stone times each day to review your inbox, and never deviate from that schedule.
6. Set up a rule (or filter in Gmail) to archive or file automatically all listserv, bar association, or other non-urgent emails.
7. Process each email once, and correctly.
8. Exercise restraint and good manners in sending your own emails.
9. Aim for zero.
   • Think carefully before you send that email to the group. Does everyone really need to see it? Can you just as easily send it to just one person, and ask them to share it with whoever needs to know?
   • Keep the message short and direct. If you have a few items to discuss, state it up front: “I’d like to mention two points.” Then state your points, succinctly.
   • Watch your “tone.” There are no body language cues or tone of voice hints as to what a person really means in email, and that’s how misunderstandings start. Eliminate ALL sarcasm from email — it just doesn’t play well. Don’t try to joke or tease; in most cases there’s just too much risk it could backfire.
   • Does the message really need to be sent at all? Can you just call the recipient or mention it the next time you see him or her?
   • Tell your recipient when there’s no need for a reply — i.e., when you’re sending information for information’s sake alone and don’t expect a response.

Get a Gmail account for all non-urgent professional & social email

This includes mail from all lists and groups (like those Google groups we’re setting up), as well as those mass group emails from social and charitable organizations we belong to, our kids’ teachers and schools, bar associations and professional groups — everything, in short, that isn’t from a court, a client, or an opposing counsel. Email from those folks, you want funneled into an offline client such as Outlook (for Windows) or Entourage or Mail (for Mac).

The benefits of Gmail are many: more storage space than you’ll ever need, free, ability to have numerous accounts, easily-set-up filters that direct mail where you want it to go, and tracking email in “conversations” rather than separate threads (which makes reading the entire history of an email exchange much easier). But the best and most underused feature of Gmail: the search function. Built on Google’s search algorithm, it will be your life saver if you let it.

Create strong labels or a strong folder architecture for each email account

The single best thing you can do to organize your email is use those labels (in Gmail) or folders (in Outlook — in Mail.app, it’s mailboxes) zealously and well. Make the labels/folder names appropriately descriptive and non-cryptic; you should be able to tell at a glance what goes where. Create an architecture for your folders that isn’t too byzantine; I’d go no further than 2 deep (i.e., I’d create a “Clients” folder and then a folder for each named client within “Clients,” but I wouldn’t go further and create a “Correspondence” and “Opposing Counsel” folder within the named-client folders; if you want to do that, skip the “Clients” folder).

Delete nothing

Stop worrying over “where that email went” — download them to your hard drive. In Gmail, simply archive them. Don’t delete emails. First, you never know when you’ll get that subpoena or FOIA request. Second, you’ll never have to wonder where it is. You’ll KNOW it’s here somewhere! Paired with robust search technology for your computer’s hard drive (and here’s where I really love my Macs and the Spotlight search), you’ll be able to find anything. The trick is to keep them out of your inbox. (See tip #9.)

Turn off ALL auto-alerts to incoming emails

If you do nothing else, do this one: turn off the little “ding” noises or bells or other sounds that play to alert you that “You’ve got mail!” What you want: total, blessed silence, and absolutely nothing popping up on your screen. No distractions whatsoever. In conjunction with the next rule, this alone will save you countless hours over the course of a year.

Establish set times each day to review your inbox, and never deviate from that schedule

Pick two times each day — mine are first thing in the morning, and again at 3:30 PM — to go over your email accounts and process your messages. Don’t check email at any other time. Now, obviously, this is not always possible. You’ll have to reconsider this rule when you’re trying to hash out an agreement via email at the last minute before a county council meeting at 6 PM. But by and large, those times should be rare exceptions. Keep this rule, and the one right before it, and you’ll be amazed how much more in control you feel.

Set up rules and filters to automatically archive/file all non-urgent emails

I belong to a group called Solosez, with over 3,000 members. In any given day, hundreds of messages come in to that particular Gmail account, just from this list. Not a single one goes into my inbox, though, because I’ve set up a filter (the equivalent of Outlook’s rules) that directs all incoming mail with a “To:” field including the Solosez list address to the archives. This reduces the number of messages in my email inbox by huge degrees, and nearly eliminates the possibility I’ll miss something important due to visual clutter.

Be diligent and fastidious in this rule; just make sure you’ve got the right logic specified or you could miss important messages. Make certain, for instance, that if you’re setting up a rule directing mail “From:” a particular email address that ALL email from that address is non-urgent. Use conjunctive logic if you need to in order to finesse your rules and filters (i.e., FROM: and keyword fields used together as parameters for the rule/filter).

Process each email once, and correctly

Here we further address our sense of moral obligation. At one point during the day (or even less often for some lists — I check Solosez mail maybe three times a week on occasion), you’ll either read the message, or mark it read. That’s right — you don’t actually have to read every single email that comes into your inbox! This is a radical thought for many, I realize.

But here’s the perspective that can change your life for the better: Stop thinking of emails as personal visits or telephone calls. They’re not, at least not anymore, if they ever were. Now, they’re like cocktail party chatter — lots of conversations going on at once, and you’re free to flit amongst the groups, drop in, drop out, tune them all out if you need to go attend to something else. This is especially true of listserv emails.

Even if the email is urgent, you can also make use of this step. If you need to take action on the email, set your tasks or calendar reminders right then — don’t delay, which is the digital equivalent of letting your junk mail pile up on the kitchen table.

Exercise restraint and good manners in sending your own emails

Remember the Golden Rule: treat others the way you’d have them treat you. Some specific suggestions on bringing the niceties back to email:

Aim for zero

Strive to keep that inbox completely empty, by moving emails to the appropriate folders for action or archival, and by downloading them off the server into your hard drive. The beauty of a clean inbox, if you’ve never experienced it, will truly inspire you! For more information about this concept, I highly recommend David Allen’s excellent book on productivity, Getting Things Done, without reservation. Not so much another time management system as a definitive and practical guide to true productivity, “GTD” as it’s known by loyal adherents will truly revolutionize the way you approach the subject of — well, getting things done.

Bonus Tip: Lose the Blackberry

I think I just collectively heard a massive scoffing sound coming from the halls of large law firms everywhere… I don’t mean lose it, literally. I mean “divorce it from your hands.” Relegate it back to its true role: a tool, not a lifeline. Which, come to think of it, isn’t bad advice for email generally.

Most state bar associations have a section or division for local government lawyers (though some lump them in with state government attorneys, who arguably have a very different set of concerns). However, in my experience, not many of them are taking full advantage of technology to bring their members in closer contact.

This is the first post in a series about organizing your state’s county & municipal bar. This post will outline a few tools that can help you get your fellow county and municipal lawyers together and talking on a regular basis. Tomorrow, the series will conclude with a list of tips on managing list/group email and discussions.

Google Groups

Google Groups is a free message and website service offered by Google. Anyone can set up a group and invite members to join via email. You can also add members directly though you should be extremely careful using this tool, and make certain you have their permission first.

Each Group is also given some limited webspace that’s easy to use. You can upload files to the site that will be downloadable only to Group members. You can also write pages (useful for collections of website links for resources or books for sale on Amazon or at any online store site, such as the ABA Publications store). Members can communicate via email or by logging on to the website and checking the new messages in a threaded format.

Members should be encouraged to use the Google Profile feature to disclose their backgrounds, current positions, contact info, and areas of expertise. This helps encourage getting to know each other, and also facilitates off-group communication in the event one member has a particular question; she or he can readily see which members have experience in that area.

The other particular use for this kind of site is as an archive. Once the group’s been in existence for awhile, it will accumulate a number of posts on various topics, all of which will be archived at the Group’s site. Future members can then search the archives for useful information when a problem arises.

Another site similar to this, and also free of charge, is the Yahoo! Groups feature.

Basecamp

Basecamp is a tool I use with CLS clients (that’s a referrer URL, by the way — if you prefer the non-referrer site, it’s here, though I’d appreciate it if you’d enter my referral code of EGR6U87F6C when prompted in sign-up; it costs you nothing, but helps me offset the expense of this site).

It’s not free — a basic membership starts at $24 a month (there is a free version but it doesn’t have the file-sharing feature enabled, which in my opinion is the single most useful feature of this site, among many useful features). However, for functionality and ease of use, it’s hard to beat Basecamp.

Here’s how it works: You sign up for your account, and Basecamp sets up your website at a particular URL related to the account name you choose. You establish Projects, and can upload documents (up to specified limits — for more info on the various packages see here); then you specify which individuals have access to which aspects of the site. You can track and manage tasks, projects, deadlines, and more with Basecamp. It truly is colllaborative project management of the best kind, and worth every penny in my view.

Blogs

You can easily set up your own free blog specific to your state’s government law issues, or perhaps dedicated to a particular aspect of county/municipal law (the Zoning Blawg, anyone?).

There are two main free blog hosting sites: WordPress.com and Blogger.com. Either will work well, though I find WordPress a more feature-rich and useful platform.

After you sign up for your free account at either site, you’ll be “walked through” the relatively painless processes of setting up your new blog. You’ll have limited options for templates for either platform; for more choice and customization, you can go the self-hosting route by registering your own URL, signing up for hosting, and installing your own WordPress files, However, this can be daunting for many attorneys who aren’t familiar with FTP and working behind the scenes with websites.

Blogs can be used as a rudimentary knowledge management system. Using categories and tags, you can accumulate posts on specific sub-topics within larger contexts, in whatever organizational taxonomy makes sense for your purposes.  Allowing others to post creates a group blog and harnesses the unique skills and expertise of others; it also lessens the burden of administering the blog by sharing the load.

Wikis

Wikis are another content management approach. The best known wiki is probably Wikipedia.  You can set up a wiki for your own group at sites such as PBWiki.com. Up to three users can use the site’s services for free; other group sizes and the associated costs are set forth here.

The advantage some see in setting up a wiki as opposed to a blog is one of layout and format. Wikis make use of internally hyperlinked pages, whereas most blogs rely heavily on links to outside pages. You can create entries based on other people’s work and thereby create an ever-expanding body of reference work. For this reason, wikis are best suited for explorations of topics, rather than new developments (at which blogs excel).

Are there other tools? Without doubt. Drop me a line in the comments section below or in the contact form here, and suggest others. I’ll pass them on in future posts.