80 – 20 rule

You can finish 80% of you work (atleast pretend to) by spending 20% of your time replying to emails.

It works each and every time I’ve tried 🙂

4 Comments

  1. anomalizer · May 21, 2004 Reply

    U mean if i reply to 80% of my mails its gonna look like I did 20% of my work?
    Too cool.
    I reply to 0% of my mails and make it look like I did 100% of my work :))

  2. mannu · May 21, 2004 Reply

    Replying to emails is officially part of my job. I like it. I spend about 20% of my work time explaining to people (customer support, product management, developers who review my code, …) in different parts of the world why things should be done in a particular way, how we can justify the added complexity to buy performance, why things are taking time 🙂 etc.

    Writing successful emails is a craft. Unlike journal entries, which you can edit and delete as you will, emails cannot be modified once sent out. If your business (or job) depends on the email you send, you’d better make sure it’s good.

  3. dhempe · May 21, 2004 Reply

    you have taken words out of my mouth kallu ! 😉

  4. priyatam · May 22, 2004 Reply

    i cant believe

    you sound suspiciously similar 2 me now. I dont know how important it is at ur ‘techie’ job though., out here at my client’s place all i do is write mails to cover up my ass (& blow others’ a***!). Writing prof mails is really rewarding, not to forget adding the CC to the right people ;). unfortunately many of us dont understand the concept of a CC, when it could prob be the ladder to your next promotion !!!

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