Mike Jackson is a Managing Partner at Earthshot Ventures, a $95 million climate-focused venture fund supporting entrepreneurs tackling the world’s biggest sustainability challenges. His day-to-day work consists of managing deal flow, supporting founders, and staying connected with co-investors.
It’s high-stakes work that demands deep thought and analysis, communication with a variety of stakeholders, and make-or-break decisions. But like so many professionals, Mike was being held back by one of the biggest productivity killers of the modern workplace: email.
The Challenge: A Flood of Messages and Constant Distraction
On an average day, Mike receives “a couple hundred” emails. The majority don’t require immediate attention, but that didn’t stop them from hijacking his focus.
“Ninety-five percent of what I get, maybe even higher, does not need to be dealt with right now,” he explained. “But things popping up in your inbox otherwise show up as urgent, and the natural tendency is to lean over and click on that thing when you see that there’s a number ‘1’ in the tab.”
The result was a constant cycle of distraction. “Email is otherwise just this never-ending task. It’s a Sisyphean task. You clear out your inbox, you email everybody back, and then lo and behold, it fills back up again. There’s just no way to get ahead of it. You’re constantly this slave to emails coming in.”
For someone whose success depends on thoughtful decision-making, being reactive to every ping wasn’t sustainable. Jackson needed a way to reclaim control of his inbox and his attention.
The Solution: Boomerang’s Inbox Pause
That’s the way it was until several years ago, when Mike discovered Inbox Pause, Boomerang’s feature that stops new emails from appearing in your inbox until you’re ready for them.
“Being able to turn that off, have it come into my inbox on a regular cadence, just makes it a lot easier for me to get a handle on my inbox, be much more intentional about it, versus being deeply reactive,” he said.
Instead of a steady stream of interruptions, Jackson now receives emails in three daily scheduled batches. “They come in at 11:55 at night, then at noon, and then at three or four. And that’s generally worked for me.”
That rhythm helps him treat email as a task—something to work on deliberately with a beginning and an end—rather than a constant drip. “My goal each day is to make sure I’ve cleared out the emails that I received yesterday, replied to them, archived them, whatever it may be. I try to turn email into a daily task, rather than a whenever-the-heck-it-comes-in task.”
The Results: More Focus, Less Stress
The difference has been profound. “I’m much more productive… I can’t recall a time that there has been a problem that I have had with my inbox paused.”
Inbox Pause hasn’t created bottlenecks. Instead, it’s helped clarify what channels are truly urgent. “If something’s urgent, email is not the right place for it. If something’s urgent, you should be sending a Slack message or texting. We’re a small team—five full-time people. If one of our companies is having an urgent issue, they’ll be calling me, not emailing.”
By shifting expectations and relying on the right tool for the right kind of message, Jackson has reduced stress and increased his focus. “It turns [email] from a continuous job to one in batches, or finite processes to work through.”
Why Mike Relies on Inbox Pause: Essential for Deep Work
Mike has experimented with many productivity systems but Inbox Pause is the foundation.
“I would fall apart as a human being if this product turned off. And it’s amazing to me that more people don’t do it. It’s such an obvious idea, very much in that vein of avoiding the constant distraction of the modern age.”
The approach aligns with the philosophy of Cal Newport, a friend of Jackson’s from childhood and author of Deep Work. Newport argues that knowledge workers thrive when they filter out noise and create space for focus. Jackson has lived that lesson firsthand.
“You’re much better off if you can filter out distractions. My productivity as a human is unambiguously higher.” For a venture investor, separating signal from noise isn’t just about inbox management, it’s central to the work itself.
“The noise to a signal is off the charts, and so being able to accomplish significant things, I think, requires you to be able to filter out the noise.”
Inbox Pause has given Mike a system that enforces that discipline. Instead of being ruled by a never-ending flood of messages, he now processes them in manageable, intentional blocks.
What once felt like chaos has become a structured, repeatable workflow. And in an industry where focus and clarity can mean the difference between missing and seizing an opportunity, that shift is invaluable.
Raising the Bar for Email Productivity
For Mike, Boomerang’s Inbox Pause isn’t just a nice-to-have—it’s become foundational to how he works. By turning email from a constant stream into a few intentional batches, he’s been able to reclaim his time, sharpen his focus, and dedicate more energy to the deep, high-value work his role demands.
Instead of chasing every notification, he operates on his own terms. Urgent issues reach him through calls or Slack, while his inbox stays quiet until he’s ready. What once felt like a Sisyphean burden is now a manageable, structured workflow.
Nisha Agarwal
Mike Gifis
Shalendra Singh
