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**Sets alarm for 6am, checks email, goes to bed**

**Wakes up to sound of alarm, turns off alarm, checks email** 

Does this routine sound familiar? I can’t be the only one that is nearly attached at the hip to my phone, checking email constantly. For over a decade now, email has been only of the top forms of communication for businesses.

Of course, as time and the workplace itself evolves, there’s an increasing amount of internal communication options. There are apps like Slack, for example, and many people still prefer the good, old-fashioned method of having a conversation in person. But as these methods for interacting grow in number, it also becomes a bit trickier to remember the right “etiquette” for all of them.

But email hasn’t exactly become a thing of the past — yet — it’s just that many of us have forgotten the right way to use it, at least in the workplace. That’s why it’s as important as ever to make good, effective use of it, which means maintaining some basic do’s and don’ts.

As you’ll see from the list below, effective email communication means that it needs to be both relevant and appropriate, depending on its subject and importance. Read on to see the full list.

How to Use Workplace Email Most Effectively

The Do’s

1) Personalize.

No matter whether it’s an internal email to your best friend/co-worker, or a message full of important information to a client, you should always get in the habit of addressing that person appropriately. A good rule of thumb is to address this person as you would in conversation, whether by first name or more formally.

2) Adapt.

By that, I mean: Know your recipient. Study any past emails this person has sent, recognize her tone or writing style, and adapt to that. If her emails are historically short and straight to the point, it might just mean that she’s extremely busy. In that case, try and be concise in your response emails.

3) Always check before clicking “send.”

This point might be the ultimate “do” when emailing. One of the worst feelings is clicking “send,” only to realize that you missed something, didn’t attach a document, or misspelled something (and hey — we’ve all been there). Pro tip: To avoid these mishaps, don’t put the email address in the “to” line until you’ve had a chance to double-check the message.

4) Keep messages short.

There’s no point in fluffing an email with extraneous details — rather, get straight to the point. An email that could double as a novella is not time-effective for the both sender or recipient. We’ll leave it at that.

5) Keep your inbox clean.

We know you’re out there — the folks with unopened emails that number in the triple digits (or worse). When I imagine a horror movie that’s set in a work environment, the vision of hundreds of unopened emails makes me want to sink into the couch and cover my eyes with a blanket. Clean your inbox, break up folders for different clients, and work toward diminishing the stress that can result from seeing big numbers next to your inbox button.

6) Check your email on your time.

In other words: Don’t get caught in the trap o checking your email every few minutes. One of the biggest momentum killers is getting in the habit of checking your email frequently, pausing what you’re working on, and having to reset your focus.

At Revenue River Marketing, we aim to check our email a total of 3-4 times each day, unless it’s necessary to spend more time on it because of something urgent. That practice helps us stay engaged with content creation and client deliverables.

7) Remember that some things are better kept to yourself.

“Oh, you just got back from your buddy’s bachelor party in Las Vegas? Oh, you want to email me and recount the details of it that should probably never surface more than once in your life?”

Stop right there. Receiving emails that fit this discription through your workplace email address is not a good idea.

That’s not to say that your employer is monitoring your emails — although, some might have the right to do so — and maybe you work for a company that wouldn’t necessary frown upon a rambunctious trip to Las Vegas. But here’s a place where common sense is best practiced — some experiences are better left remembered via personal email.

8) Use Zoom and Slack as alternatives.

Across the board, many companies are implementing video conferencing tools like Zoom, for a number of reasons. Not only do they support a global workforce, but also, it provides an alternative to email that can help clarify important connotations that are sometimes lost over email.

Instant messaging apps like Slack, too, are also growing in popularity — not only can they help you get quicker answers from your colleagues, but also, it helps to isolate email as a more formal method of communication.

That said, it’s easy for instant messaging conversations to stray from work topics — but we’re all human, and sometimes, that means sending your colleague the occasional funny GIF image. But, it still helps to reduce email clutter by sending an informal note that doesn’t need to be communicated over email.

The Don’ts

1) Abbrv8 — I mean, abbreviate.

Although we aren’t ranking these tips, this one is might top the list of don’ts. Remember, no matter how laid back your workplace might be, it’s still a professional setting. You might not want to get into the habit of signing emails with things like, “thx,” “lol,” or “c u @ wrk l8r,” only to mindlessly send an email to a client with similar vernamular. Here’s a helpful resource to make sure abbreviations NEVER happen: The Slang Translator

2) !!!!!!!!!

Ah yes, another one that gives me chills every time I see it: the exclamation point. Because I am a visual person, I see the overuse of exclamation points — or the dreaded “caps lock email” — as yelling. Other people might, too. If used excessively, the exclamation point can give false expectations and look unprofessional. There is a right time for an exclamation point, but before you think about holding your fingers down on the “Shift” “1” keys, think about the context in which your email may be received. 

3) 🙂 or 🙁

This may just be me, but does anyone else get a little cringe when you see a smiley/sad face in an email? In a professional setting, much like abbreviating, it gives off the vibe of being a bit too laid back. Keep it professional, and leave out the emoticons. 

4) Send the one-word “okay” or “thanks” response.

Not to counter the point above, but while keeping messages short is ideal — sending the dreaded, non-descriptive one-word email is not. Sometimes, people need a detailed answer. Something like content that’s ready for edits, for example, can’t be answered with a simple “okay”, so give the sender the courtesy of the answer or closure they need. 

5) Use the reply-all button at will.

There comes a time in every marketer’s life at which she realizes that the “reply-all” is rarely necessary. If you haven’t learned that lesson yet, allow this post serve as it.

Replying-all to the email includes multiple people who likely don’t need to be looped in on every single response in the chain. Reply only to the people who need to see your response — their inboxes will thank you.

6) Email if you’re burnt out.

It’s 11:30 a.m. — almost lunch time — and you can practically hear your stomach yelling your name for food. Or, better yet, you just surfaced from your computer screen after writing several blog posts in a row, and your eyes are all but glazed over. But then you remember that you need to send a work email; one that requires serious thought, and wonder, “Should I just get this over with now?”

No.

Take a deep breath, stand up, take a lap, and get some water. There are so many instances where an important email should wait — based on your current level of patience or stress. After you take a break, determine if you feel level-headed enough to send a clear and thought-out email.

Let’s face it: We’ve all broken at least one of these rules. But next time you find yourself tempted to repeat it, take a step back from the keyboard — and think about this list.

Last night, I began to read an excellent novel right before I went to bed. The plot twists! The engaging dialogue! The cliffhangers! It was a great read. But when I finally went to put the book down two hours later, I was completely wired and nowhere near sleep, and I wasn’t too productive the next day.

I always thought it was a good habit to read before bed. Was I wrong?

Kind of. I had failed to take my own advice — to do something mindless before bed — and had instead remained engaged in something that was mentally stimulating, instead of something that helped me wind down. Stress is stress, whether its source is work or a fictional heroine who won’t leave her unfaithful husband. And that stress is responsible for 33% of adults losing sleep.

But my story shows that external stressors aren’t always to blame. Sometimes, our own routines are getting in the way of our productivity, especially when it comes time to settle in for the evening. It’s not easy, but with a little recognition and behavior modification, your bedtime routine can go from wrecking your work, to enhancing your productivity.

You’re Not Sleeping Enough, and Your Bedtime Routine Could be to Blame

As you may have guessed, we are faced with a sleep deprivation epidemic — 34.8% of U.S. adults sleep less than the recommended minimum of seven hours each night. And it’s getting expensive. In the U.S., the lack of productivity caused by sleep loss costs employers as much as $411 billion a year.

Less than seven hours in one night is what the CDC calls “short sleep”: a term we’ll use throughout this post. Among such side effects as high blood pressure and diabetes, short sleep can also lead to “frequent mental distress.” In other words, it can really mess up our work, and life in general.

On top of that, short sleep is linked to a higher probability of obesity, probably due to its correlation with poor eating habits. When you’re sleep-deprived, you’re more likely to mindlessly eat or make less-than-healthy food choices. But we also eat poorly when we’re stressed, and when we’re stressed, we don’t sleep well. All of these behaviors are linked and, ultimately, are leading to this epidemic of exhaustion.

That network of cause-and-effect does more than illustrate that you’re probably not sleeping enough. It shows the complexity behind why you’re not sleeping enough, which is where your bedtime routine comes in. So let’s explore some of the “why”s. Once you’re aware of them, you can fix them.

6 Reasons Why Your Bedtime Routine Is Wrecking Your Productivity

1) You’re eating a bunch of crap (and probably too late in the day).

In addition to short sleep causing bad eating habits, the same thing works in reverse — diets high in saturated fat and carbohydrates, for example, have been linked to lower sleep quality. Plus, our tolerance for glucose decreases later in the day, so eating late at night can also throw off our circadian rhythm, the biological sleep-and-wake pattern of humans.

But willpower is hard — and as my colleague Mike Rehahan once told me, it depletes as the day progresses. So, the later it gets, the more tempted we are to indulge in comfort food that we don’t have to cook ourselves. After a long, tired day, it’s a recipe — no pun intended — for disaster. You’re not just more likely to indulge. You also risk depriving yourself of quality sleep, creating a vicious cycle of exhaustion.

Here’s where planning ahead can tremendously help. When the weekend rolls around, all we really want to do is watch Netflix and shop online. But setting aside two hours on Sunday afternoon to cook meals for the week can help preserve your willpower on those late nights. 

2) Sleep isn’t in your schedule.

When our days are already so overbooked, it seems ridiculous to schedule something like sleeping. But it’s called a routine for a reason — “setting a pattern of going to bed at the same time each night and rising at the same time each morning,” according to the CDC, is key to sleeping well.

Last year, I shared a technique I use called time blocking. It’s the formal term for my habit of creating calendar events for everything — getting dressed, working out, and feeding my dog. But when I realized that I was slipping into the bad habit of being liberal with my bedtime, I knew that I would need to schedule time to turn off my electronics, too.

When I asked my team to share the bedtime habits that mess with their productivity, HubSpot Director of Marketing Emma Brudner replied, “Falling into the rabbit hole of the internet for hours.”

She’s not alone — I have a bad habit of turning a simple search for a carbonara recipe into an hours-long research session on the culinary arts. And when that happens, my desired bedtime falls to the wayside.

That said, too much screen time before has other impacts on sleep quality, which we’ll discuss later. But scheduling a time to unplug can prevent those evening hours from wasting away. Depending on your bedtime, try programming a recurring calendar event to shut down two hours before you actually want to get to sleep for Monday through Wednesday. As it becomes habitual, start adding additional nights.

3) You’re planning your next work day at home.

I’m a big believer in the separation of home and office. Even when I work from home, I have a special space set aside to attend to my tasks — every other area is an off-limits, no-work zone.

That accomplishes two things. First, it helps to keep certain distractions out of sight while I’m working. And when I’m not, having a something like a designated “weekend chair” keeps me from checking work email when I should be recharging — as 50% of us are wont to do.

That’s why I also believe that all work-related tasks, including planning for the next day, should be limited to designated work spaces only. Thinking about that seemingly endless schedule can cause some anxiety, which you don’t want to bring into a place that’s designated for personal time — especially at a time of day when you’re supposed to be winding down.

It might mean staying at the office a bit later, but planning your next day at a designated workspace can help maintain your home and sleeping areas as a stress-free sanctuary. Try it tonight — chances are, you’ll be glad you left your work at work.

4) You’re putting off morning stuff until the morning.

We know — when else would you do morning things?

But my colleague, Sophia Bernazzani, stresses the value of getting certain morning tasks done in advance, and she suggests taking “15 minutes to lay out your outfit, pack your lunch, and prep your coffee” the night before.

If you’re not a morning person, she explains, “decision-making abilities are limited — so you should save them for work.” So, completing these items ahead of time not only gives you the peace of mind of having them done — but also, it frees up a bit of time in the morning to sleep more, work out, or meditate, which is shown to lower stress levels by 31% and increase energy throughout the day by 28%.

5) You’re ignoring your tension.

We have instincts for a reason — we’re built to instinctively seek out the things that will help us survive. Those are represented in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, which includes sleep at its baseline.

Source: Wikimedia Commons

When we ignore our instincts, things start to go haywire because we’re essentially fighting biology. And when we ignore our instinct to sleep — by reading “just one more” chapter, or watching “just one more” episode — it can lead to even more tension over the fact that we’re losing sleep.

It’s very meta, but stressing over a loss of sleep will only make you less likely to fall asleep, since — say it with me — stress causes sleep loss.

But when you can’t get that stress off your mind, write it down. It makes sense that journaling before bed has shown to improve sleep quality — it gives your troublesome thoughts somewhere else to “live,” rather than being mentally recycled when you’re trying to quiet your mind.

6) You’re looking at screens.

We’re starting to feel a bit like a bunch of broken records with this one — yes, we harp away about ditching the screens before bed. And yet, nearly half of us continue to use our smartphones before bed.

But if you’re getting as sick of reading about it as we are of nagging about it, here’s a quick rundown, courtesy of Harvard:

• Blue light is the kind emitted from most electronics.
• It’s often cited as the culprit for sleep loss, because it sends a signal to your brain that daylight is present.
• That — like so many of the behaviors we’ve listed here — causes disorder to your circadian rhythm. When your brain thinks there’s daylight, it also thinks it’s time to wake up, not go to bed.

Seriously. Put the screens away before bed.

And if you absolutely must look at your screen close to bedtime, consider investing in an app that will adjust its blue light depending on the time of day, like f.lux or PC SunScreen.

Give It a Rest

Our cultural sleep deprivation might make things look a bit bleak. It’s causing us to be grossly underproductive, which is causing our collective employers to lose a lot of money. Not only that, but it’s making us sick.

But we hope this post emphasizes that it doesn’t have to be that way, and that our bad bedtime habits can be modified. Don’t try to tackle all of these things at once — start with the one that’s easiest for you to change, and once you master it, slowly work your way through the list.

Consider the fact that people who sleep six hours or less each night lose about six days worth of productivity each year. When you feel tempted to stay up late, ask yourself, “What could I do with six extra days?” Let yourself dream — it’ll be worth it.