A long time ago in a galaxy far far away…
Sorry…I missed May the 4th. I went skiing. Deep powder.
But really, a long time ago as I was going through my email on day I thought
This is dumb. Why am I the one dealing with all this garbage.
So I started teaching someone to deal with some of my email for me.
Waking up with an inbox free of spam and free of garbage I don’t want to see is such a relief and so rewarding. It’s a simple process I was able to work through with someone else to accomplish something significant. I succeed. They succeed. We have interaction with each other. Win. Win. Win.
Over the years it evolved into more. She now responds to some of my email for me. Usually she doesn’t send the emails, she just makes drafts so I get to review them first.
But I know a lot of you aren’t comfortable with the idea of sharing your email password with your OFS. If you use your email to sign in to websites, you wouldn’t want anyone to have access to your email.
If you use Google Workspace or Gmail, what you can do is turn on Gmail delegation. https://support.google.com/a/answer/7223765?hl=en
Email delegation lets delegated users (your OFS) read, send, and delete messages on the account owner’s behalf.
How is this better than giving your OFS your username and password? It’s better because they don’t need to log in to your account to manage your email. They don’t know your password, so they can’t log in to websites using your account. You don’t have to deal with 2FA and getting them into your account.
Take note that if your OFS sends an email on your behalf, it will show a “sent by” (your OFS’ email) in addition to the “from” address. Unfortunately, the “sent by” can’t be removed so people will see that your OFS is emailing for you.
And…you might be surprised by people’s reaction to your OFS sending emails for you. Some people won’t say anything. But some will love it and they’ll let you know.
John