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How to Master Email Efficiency

by | March 4, 2024 | Blog, Entrepreneurship

In coaching founders, developing and sticking to an efficient email management process continues to be one of the most frequent requests. As a founder or solopreneur, it is essential that you stick to an efficient system for managing emails. Timely communication is essential. Constantly checking your emails detracts from the more important deep work tasks.

Whether you’re drowning in a sea of unread messages or simply aiming to streamline your communication, here are some tried-and-true tips to help you manage email effectively.

Reduce the number of email boxes: Do you really need five email accounts? Consolidate or eliminate as many as possible.

Prioritize Your Inbox: Start by sorting your emails based on urgency and importance. Focus on tackling high-priority emails first, ensuring that critical messages are addressed promptly.

Utilize Email Filters and Folders: Organize your inbox by creating filters and folders to automatically categorize incoming emails. This helps reduce clutter and allows you to concentrate on specific topics or projects at a time.

Set Specific Email Time Blocks: Instead of constantly checking your inbox throughout the day, allocate dedicated only 2-3 time blocks for email management. This prevents constant interruptions, allowing you to concentrate on other tasks without being overwhelmed by a flood of messages.

Unsubscribe and Declutter: Weed out unnecessary emails by unsubscribing from newsletters and promotional emails that no longer serve your interests. Decluttering your inbox from irrelevant content can significantly reduce the time spent sifting through messages.

Use Keyboard Shortcuts: Familiarize yourself with keyboard shortcuts for your email platform. These shortcuts can help you navigate through emails swiftly, improving your overall efficiency. See keyboard shortcuts for email

Batch Process Emails: Group similar tasks together and batch process emails to enhance productivity. Respond to similar queries in one go, reducing the mental load associated with context-switching between diverse topics.

By implementing these strategies, you can regain control of your inbox, boost productivity, and ensure that your email communication aligns seamlessly with your daily workflow. Remember, the key lies in finding a personalized approach that suits your work style and enables you to navigate the digital realm with ease.

What else takes up valuable time and energy in your workday? Contact me at Rebecca@MIndfulCommunication.com. Visit MindfulCommunication.com

Innovative Enough?

by | June 20, 2023 | Entrepreneurship, Innovation, Uncategorized

When resources are scarce and VC money is tight, your idea for a new venture had better be “innovative.” But what does that mean?

My conversations with mentors and serial entrepreneurs revealed that an “innovative idea” is subjective and depends on several factors: the industry, market trends, and individual perspectives. But if we were to nail down a definition of “innovative” that would pass muster with an investor, it would include these six points. Is your idea:

  • Original?  Does your product present a unique perspective or approach to a pressing problem?
  • Market relevant?  It must fulfill a need, create value, or meet an emerging demand.
  • Differentiated from the competition? Will your idea stand out from competitors or existing alternatives? Tally up its distinctive features, benefits, or advantages that set it apart and make it compelling.
  • Scalable?  It should have the capacity to reach a large audience or create a significant change within a specific domain.
  • Feasible? Tell how your idea is practical given available resources, technological requirements, despite potential obstacles.
  • Intellectual property?  Unique and protectable ideas with trademarks and patents often demonstrate a higher level of innovation.

Can you speak convincingly about your idea?  Need help with a pitch presentation? CoreCoaching can help. Contact me at Rebecca@MindfulCommunication.com

Self-Care Entrepreneur Style

by | November 22, 2021 | Entrepreneurship

‘Self-care’ means different things to different people. Glen is a 62-year-old whirlwind of a founder. His family and doctor are always telling him to balance his life with more self-care, e.g., meditation, more sleep, and daily exercise. What they don’t understand is that entrepreneurs are often short on traditional self-care. Glen is in good health and enjoys being with his family, but has chosen his own path to self-care.

His version of self-care includes the basics (just enough sleep, good nutrition and movement) along with a series of activities that give him purpose, energy and great joy.  Aside from being CEO of a small, but very successful software company, his self-care plan includes: singing in the community choir, chairing the town’s finance committee, coaching high school soccer, mentoring a young entrepreneur program at the local college and studying classical piano.

Glen recalls how he almost lost his mind when his family booked a surprise cruise to the Bahamas a few years ago. He confessed, “It’s just not my way of relaxing. Yes, I juggle a lot of things, but that’s because I know how to delegate and schedule myself correctly. My version of self-care works for me and for others with my kind of brain. Go meditate on that!”

You go Glen!

Founders on the entrepreneur roller coaster need a self-care regimen that is healthy AND satisfying. CoreCoaching can help you find your kind of balance. Contact me at Rebecca@MindfulCommunication.com.       

Get Back in the Groove

by | September 16, 2021 | Entrepreneurship

Returning from vacation and getting back into a work routine can be challenging. Here are some tried and true ideas that help you get back in the groove faster:

  1. Re-start your morning rituals –the familiar, seamless routines that set the tone for a productive work day; those that include exercise, meditation and making your bed, for example.
  2. Gradually get back into your sleep regimen. 15 minutes earlier to bed every couple days until you’re back to your normal bedtime.
  3. Sync up with people you see on a regular basis, at the gym, at the local coffee shop or at the office.
  4. Resume a healthy diet and reduce the use of alcohol, etc.
  5. When you sit down to plan your day, recall those revelations you had flying 30,000 feet over mountain and plain. Perhaps you resolved a vexing problem, re-aligned your priorities or made a decision on a relationship that was well overdue. Now back on earth, can you apply those revelations and make your life easier?
  6. Overwhelmed with the 200+ emails, the to-do lists, bills, and the work you planned to finish before vacation? Break it into smaller tasks. Crank up some tunes or a podcast, get some snacks and take a small, but consistent bite out of each task every day until you get back in your groove.

Having more trouble than usual getting back in the swing of things, getting started and following through? Contact me at Rebecca@MindfulCommunication.com 

Add a Morpheus to Your Mix

by | May 31, 2021 | Entrepreneurship

A COREageous CEO listens to the good, bad and the ugly.

When passion takes hold and our vision becomes invincible, our mirror gets cloudy and we’re apt to act on murky and idealistic perceptions. It is comfortable to surround ourselves with people who share the same mirror, instead of those that come from a more realistic perspective.

Include people in your organization who will expose the weaknesses you may have denied or overlooked. As in the movie, The Matrix, the character Morpheus delivered the truth. Consider forming a small team of Morpheus’s that will help you see clearly. And will you listen?

In the highly recommended book, “The Art of the Start 2.0” the author, Guy Kawasaki, suggested having a Morpheus for each aspect of your business:

  • Research and development
  • Operations
  • Finance
  • Ethics

Kawasaki claims that a Morpheus is the yang to the CEO’s yin. The CEO decides “what” while the Morpheus identifies “what could go wrong?”

Could having a Morpheus on your team safeguard your venture?

Have trouble listening to the hard stuff that could save your startup? Listening is “my thing.” Contact me at Rebecca@MIndfulCommunication.com