Using Your Mail Trays Correctly

Having trouble figuring out how to use your mail tray? Can't quite figure out how to get organized on how many you need and how you will use each one of them?

I have seem some people at my office only use 1 mail tray, as their inbox. Others have quite a few, which I am not sure what the purpose of all of them is.





I personally have 4 mail trays:

1. The "inbox" tray - this sits at the top of all of the mail trays and is used for anything that is coming in, hence the name.
2. The "pending" tray - this sits just below the inbox tray and I place all of my items that I can't continue with until someone gives me an answer to my question(s).
3. The "filing" tray - this is for all items that need to be filed away. You want to make sure that you spend at least a few minutes each day clearing this out (if you can), so it doesn't become overwhelming.
4. The "outbox" tray - this is where I place any items that I need to give to other co-workers.

I also have separate trays for all of the 5 managers that I work with, all labelled with their names, as these are higher priority than other items.

You don't want to have too many trays on your desk because it will create more trouble than organization. You will start questioning yourself of which tray items will need to go in, if there are too many. It's always better to keep things simple. I studied marketing in college and remember using the "KISS" method - Keep It Simple Stupid. And don't worry, I am not trying to offend anyone here. That's just how the acronym works.

Are there any other trays that you can think of that you would like to add to this list? Leave a comment for the rest of us.

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Until next time,

Take care - of your clutter!


Post from: Administrative Assistant Tips