Get rid of irrelevant conversation threads
Datum: 2025-01-29 09:10

Some email conversations are really valuable, while others lose their value after a while. It started off fine with a few colleagues emailing amongst yourselves about something you are all involved in at the moment. But now the conversation has evolved and the thread keeps trailing on and on.
For you who prefer listening to reading, this post is also available as an episode of the “Done!” podcast:
Decreasing benefit
After a while, the asynchronous digital conversation develops in a direction that is no longer relevant for you. The incoming emails part of the thread contain less and less information that involves your area of responsibility and are, quite frankly, just in the way.
You ask the others to remove your email address from the thread but not everyone seems to have understood your request or know how to fulfill it, so the irrelevant emails keep on coming.
There is, however, a way out. With the press of a button, you can avoid further involvement in this now irrelevant thread.
Do this
In three of the most common emailing clients you can move the entire thread to either the archive or the bin with just a few clicks, and then have any incoming emails related to the thread stowed away in the same location, which means you will never even see them in your inbox.
This is done a little differently depending on what client you use.
- If you use Outlook you simply click “Ignore” in the group “Remove” in the tab “Start”. Do a search for “Ignore all email messages in a conversation” and you will find a more detailed description.
- In Gmail, you click the three dots labeled “More” at the top of the email and then click “Ignore”. Search for “Archive or mute Gmail messages” and you will find instructions on how it is done.
- If you use Mail in macOS you can, if you have the version called Catalina (10.15) or a more recent version, click a symbol of a bell and thereby mute boring or irrelevant conversations. You will find a description of exactly how to manage it if you search for “Mute email conversations in Mail on Mac”.
Fewer emails overall and fewer irrelevant ones at that
If you ignore or mute conversation threads you no longer want to be a part of, you will not get as many emails in your inbox as you are right now. The emails you do get will be of the kind you are actually interested in and you will not have to spend unnecessary time processing emails that are of no value to you.
What’s your way?
Have you solved this annoying but very common problem in some other way, without using any of the features I have just described? If so, feel free to email me. Maybe you’ll solve more than one person’s dilemma by doing so.
(By the way, do you know these nine ways to reduce the inflow of e‑mails?)
Want more like this?
If you want more tips on how to create good structure at work, there are many ways to get that from me - in podcasts, videos, books, talks and other formats.