Steveer Robbins here.

Welcome to the Get It Done Guys quick and dirty tips to work less and do more.

Today's topic is unifying your inboxes.

A listener tweeted to me, Hey, Steven, I want all my inquiries to arrive...

Okay, let me translate.

I want all my inquiries to arrive via email. Then I drag them

through my task list folder. What can I say to phone inquiries to get them to send a one-liner?

The trouble with clients, friends, and family is they can't read our minds and alter themselves

to conform to our wishes the way we do for them. Imagine if Melvin could read my mind.

We'd be strolling through a pharmacy, I'd spot some acne medication, and, well, maybe it's better

that Melvin can't read my mind. We all have our own systems for staying organized. If you use

your email as your main system, you'll probably want everyone to email you. That way, you

only have to look in one

place for your incoming communication, which is a good thing. When an email request comes in,

you drag it to your task list folder and, voila, you've just easily updated your to-do list.

So, how can you get people to conform to your system and send all requests via email?

You can start with a direct approach.

If someone's asking for a favor, you have negotiating leverage. In an ideal world, you want to lose the

to do anyway because, well, I mean, who has time to do favors? So, ask them to do the work. I'll forget.

Please email me that request with the subject line, To Do, Find Missing Terradactal

Egg. If they really want to find that egg, they'll be thrilled to send you the email. And if they

forget, you're off the hook and tomorrow you get to have the best omelette ever. If they're a

...