The Editor's Desk

There’s no question that e-mail has made the flow of information into our newsroom better and faster than the days of snail mail and faxes. Obviously, we live by the flow of information in the news business.

But some days I’m staggered by the amount of e-mail that rolls in. And I suspect that’s true of most people, regardless of the business they’re in.

I’m on an e-letter list for Ed and Cynthia Miller’s Newsroom Leadership Group, and recently took Ed’s advice (it’s here) about tracking e-mail content for a week or two. I broke e-mail into several categories: press releases, reader tips/complaints/compliments, internal housekeeping, etc. Some of the results were surprising.

First, my spam filter is incredibly effective (I tightened it down a few months ago). Less than 10% of the 200 or more e-mails I get most days are junk mail. About a third are press releases (not surprising), and another 15% were "news alerts" — one-sentence flashes of breaking news from wire services. But the really surprising piece: Internal house-keeping accounted for almost a quarter of all e-mail. The category of "substantive work" came up at 3%.

I’m still figuring out how to use this e-mail audit to better manage the Inbox. If anything has worked particularly well for you, please share.

– Sherry