Discussion Lists

As many of us have found, discussion lists can often be both a blessing and a curse. They are valuable for sharing information, networking, advertising open positions, looking for a job in a particular field, and keeping up-to-date. However, many discussion lists are quite large and have a high number of posts every day, so the amount of email can be overwhelming if not managed efficiently. Here are several techniques you can use to help keep your discussion list subscriptions manageable.

• Subscribe to the discussion list in digest mode if possible. In digest mode you will receive one email with that day’s posts to the discussion list.
• Use filters to sort your incoming email.
• Many large discussion lists archive posts. If an archive is available for members to search and view, then it is not necessary to save emails “in case you need them later.”
• Inactivate your subscription to the list when you are going to be out of the office (or at least make sure that your “Out of the Office” message doesn’t go out to the entire discussion list every time a message is posted).

How to decide which discussion lists to join? Professional associations usually have discussion lists for various chapters and/or divisions. Check association Web sites for more information. You can also use a tool such as L-Soft’s List Search to search for discussion lists on particular topics.