Sorry for the day delay in posting this weeks topic, but I have just returned from vacation. I want to thank Bronwyn and Ray who both covered for me in my absence with great topics.

Ray’s discussion on Too Much Free continues here and we may revisit the topic at some distant date as there was much interest from many who could not make the dinner.

Naturally I was ever totally disconnected but I never bought wifi from the hotel for the laptop (which mainly was used to download picture like this one of me swimming with a sea turtle or one of the many fantastic sunsets) and the kids and my indulgence in the game/app godfinger via both my iPhone and iPad (don’t download this application unless you have much free time to spare) left me with more then a slight backlog of email.

While some would argue that email is dead I do not think anyone who is really doing anything of substance can really turn their back on it.

So how can one tame the email beast in such away that it does not require you to become a slave to it?

As if in answer to some of my problem, Google launched their Priority Inbox feature while I was away. It looks like this new tool will help users make more effective decisions about their email and to avoid constantly looking at their email in what David Allen, author of Getting Things Done, calls the "emergency scanning mode" because they have no way to prioritize all the messages in their inboxes.

This features bring back to mind some of Craig Huggart’s book “Escape From Email Hell”, some of which can be read here. http://bit.ly/9Mnz2F...

Marketers are already finding Googles new tool difficult to game so perhaps there is hope for regaining control of our email boxes after all controlling the flow of email is really the crux of the email problem.

Now maybe I am pining to much hope on a tool and for that matter on what Google really knows, at least analytically, about my needs and priorities. I do not subscribe to the creep factor related to Google and Gmail and if a tool can really prioritize my emails so that the important stuff is at the top and the noise gets pushed down then perhaps I can gain more efficient focus to my monster of an email box (actually boxes).

So what are you doing to master your email beast and are you a slave to your mobile device?

What are the keys to mastering this critical communication path and are tools enough or must one take matters more drastically into one own hands?

Join us as we explore taming the email beast and other questions of communication in a connected age.

As always, there is no better way to meet and connect with other executives then over dinner and conversation. $21 in advance via PayPal or $25 at the event gets you a full dinner, drink and the best networking around.