Eliminating e-mail: how it improved team communication and productivity

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Several years ago I found myself questioning the impact of email on my team and myself. I felt it was counterproductive, time wasting, and increased everyone's stress level.

There were 3 key concerns:

1. Lots of requests and demands filling up inboxes and team members struggling to keep up.

2. Lots of emails sent internally creating more inbox clutter.

3. Time wasted searching through email threads to find the information your require.

Personally, I was feeling overwhelmed and dreaded opening my email inbox in fear of what would confront me. If I was feeling this way, imagine how my team felt. I knew it was time for a change.

To make a change in my business I first needed to understand what my options were. I started researching centralised email systems, collaboration tools, and file sharing. I had observed businesses move to “role based” email addresses such as enquiries@ or sales@. This seemed logical and a better way to communicate. I set about researching specific software products, setting up trials, and asking the team for input and feedback.

What we ended up achieving was game changing for my business.

1. Set up “role based” emails

Moving to role based email addresses meant centralising incoming emails. This resulted in visibility across the business to all client requests. When team members were away, someone could view the client request and action it on their behalf. Clients received responses in a more timely manner which resulted in a happier environment.

2. Implement Customer Service email software

We chose Help Scout from the several great options available. This customer service software for managing emails provided fantastic visibility to all incoming requests. It allowed us to allocate emails to the correct team members to resolve. Finding client communication was much easier as all emails were in the one central location. The reporting functions allowed us to asses time taken to respond to clients and which days of the week were the busiest. It showed me how much spam or junk email was being received as well. Overall this provided a much clearer insight into what tasks were being requested from clients and how long we took to deliver the results.

3. Stop internal emails

To reduce the email clutter we agreed to stop internal emailing. It was easy to forward, cc or send emails to one another without thinking about the consequences. However, if we were serious about solving the problem then this needed to stop. It took a lot of discipline and focus to adjust to a new communication system. Stopping internal emails resulted in incoming mail predominately being from clients, letting us pay attention to their needs without distractions.

4. Communicate internally using team messaging tools

To stop emailing internally we needed some alternatives. We implemented Slack for team messaging. This removed all the chatter that once appeared in emails and moved it to a collaborative platform that was effective and fun! We implemented Asana for managing projects and sharing client information amongst the team. Centralising client discussions and sharing of information away from email meant it was easier to search and find key information. As one team member stated: “it was just easier to share information with my team members and I could also post some fun stuff to brighten up the day”

5. Save email attachments to a file sharing tool

Looking for file attachments on emails is time consuming and frustrating. It would often result in multiple team members looking for the same files. We implemented Box as our file sharing tool. We made it a requirement that all email attachments were filed in Box under a strict client filing structure. This saved so much time searching for documents and required less time digging through clients emails looking for that illusive file. What a relief!

This is my journey relating to my business. There are many software options and we trialled several before deciding on the one that best suited the business. I always recommend trialling several options before deciding on the best one for your business. I then insure time is put into setup and training of the team to achieve the best outcomes.