Each morning is the same for me.
Push the snooze button a few times, hit the shower, get dressed and start up my computer to check my e-mail.
As a Baker student, I know that if I don’t check my e-mail first thing in the morning, it will just continue to pile up and will just take more time to check later.
As Baker students, we get a number of e-mails each and every day in our Baker e-mail account. Yes, some of them are valuable and important, and are about things that I am interested in, or need to read. But most of them are things that I, and I know other BU students, just don’t care about.
Almost 1,000 college students are on this campus that have too much going on to be sifting through countless e-mails about clubs that are meeting, or panels that will be coming to campus, which have no value to them.
And while I personally find it amusing to check out what some of my friends will be eating in the dining hall each week, it doesn’t pertain to me. I don’t eat there, yet each week I know I’ll get that friendly reminder e-mail about what’s being served in the Allen Dining Hall.
So, my piece of advice to solve the e-mail overload crisis?
Set up distribution lists, or have people subscribe that are interested in getting those e-mails.
Sports Information Director Kevin Kunde is a great example of doing this. Now, people who are interested in getting statistics and Baker sports information can subscribe to that information, and get it in a timely manner.
By setting these lists up, students e-mails aren’t bogged down and we’re not missing an important e-mail containing information from a professor, or a message from our parents about a younger sibling’s birthday party next weekend.
Another great piece of advice would be to utilize the Wildcat Wire. If a group or a club is meeting on campus, put that information in the Wire, and then trust that as young adults, the students will read the information.
There doesn’t need to be follow-up e-mails, or multiple reminders sent out to the entire campus about where groups will be meeting or what will be happening at the meeting. Just put it in the Wire, and then trust that the students will take it from there.
With the holiday season and the new year right around the corner, I would urge each person that is ready to hit the “send” button to stop and think whether or not what you’re sending really does need to go out to the entire campus.
Because believe me, if you do send it, someone who really needs that information is bound to hit “delete” because they are so overwhelmed with everything else in their inbox.
