Is the Email Integration Important?
You are setting up your Priority Matrix. You might notice that Priority Matrix has an email integration and wonder whether this should matter to you.
This Depends on You
If so, great question! There are many aspects of Priority Matrix that may or may not be relevant to your particular situation. After all, it is designed to conform to your use case, not the other way around. There isn’t one perfect way to use the system so you should be asking questions like this.
The answer depends the different types of email sequences that you experience most.
What Is an Email Sequence?
By email sequence, we mean the steps that an email landing in your inbox triggers. Step one is opening and reading the email. After this the steps vary greatly.
Should I Manage Each Step in My Inbox?
For your peace of mind, not all of these steps should be managed in your inbox.
Steps to Manage in the Inbox
Besides reading your email, steps like forwarding, responding and deleting should naturally be managed in the inbox. Any external system to help you do this would take more trouble than it is worth!
Steps to Manage in Priority Matrix
Other steps are better moved elsewhere. Tasks like setting aside time to ponder the email, looping people in for a discussion, or completing/assigning action items belong elsewhere.
Steps to Make the Call on
Whether or not you should archive an email in your inbox depends on the situation. If you want to save this email as a record, keep it in your email client. However, archive the email for functional purposes where it can be a handy resource, like in Priority Matrix.
Exploring Different Email Scenarios
Now, let’s review some email scenarios that produce different sequences. This will help you get a sense of whether or not the email integration is going to be a big feature for you.
Sending to Trash
This is a scenario that does not require or benefit from the email integration. You are not interested in preserving this email at all so do not move this email into Priority Matrix.
Email A.K.A. an Action Item
However, not all emails are like this. Some emails are action items in disguise. Because Priority Matrix is designed to hold all your priorities, it doesn’t make sense to exclude email action items from the system. In this case, you should move the email into Priority Matrix and rename the imported item to indicate the action needed. When finished you can navigate back to your inbox through the item and respond.
If It Doesn’t Pass the 1-Minute Test…
Even it you don’t technically need to complete any task before responding to an email, sometimes you are not ready to reply right away. Maybe you can’t reply in less than a minute or it cannot be made a priority. Once again, take advantage of the email integration. Priority Matrix can help you remember to reply better than a flag in your inbox.
Avoiding a Long Back and Forth Email Chain
We’ve all been here. An email comes in and you need to run it by the team. While the classic solution is to hit *forward,* Priority Matrix has a better option. Import the item and invite the relevant team members as followers. You can then hold a conversation around the email and all its details right in Priority Matrix.
Seven Benefits of Discussing an Email in Priority Matrix
Pulling in an email to discuss in Priority Matrix actually offers seven benefits:
- The conversation is in real time. There is less confusion and a quicker conclusion.
- This discussion exists in context of other priorities.
- Any one else that sees the item can provide valuable input.
- You can invite more people to the conversation if needed and they can quickly catch of up on the history of the conversation.
- It’s the gift that keeps on giving. Even if the original stakeholders are no longer with the organization, perspectives and decisions made in that moment can help new team members.
- Your (and everyone else’s) inbox will thank you. Instead of generating dozens more emails, you only create one new item in Priority Matrix.
- You avoid running the risk of responding back to the original email with the discussion included and escape a potentially awkward situation.
Assign a Task (Don’t Forward With Instructions)
An email you receive requires that you assign someone else a task. Here the email integration is also useful. Moving the email to Priority Matrix helps you track the action item as it goes forward and lighten your inbox.
Your Email Item Can Roll With the Punches
If two steps occur in the inbox, you can easily convert the email that you imported. Once the discussion comes to an end, you can translate the item to better facilitate the task (renaming the item and adding other context) and assign it to the right person.
Forward an Email Once in a Blue Moon
Finally, here is an instance where forwarding the email is encouraged. If you don’t have any stake in the sequence of steps to take and simply need to send the email to the right person (not you), don’t worry about creating an item in Priority Matrix. Simply forward it to to the right person and they can decide what action sequence to take. This is different from assigning the email as a task in Priority Matrix because, there you had at least a cursory involvement in the situation.
Setting Up Email Integration
Using Priority Matrix to manage emails in the right situations, you can make strides to escape the clutches of your inbox.
Priority Matrix supports streamlined integration with Gmail, Outlook, Apple Mail and Office 365. However, if you use a different email client, no worries! You can still access an email address for each quadrant in each Priority Matrix project and forward emails into your project.
Automatic Forwarding and Custom Triggers
If you wish to automatically forward emails into Priority Matrix or set up trigger, please schedule some time to discuss this with one of our experts.