How to get the most from your IT tools – This issue I see all the time and it is not hard to solve!

Managing personal email on a work laptop is something most of us just work out as we go.

You get a work laptop, open a browser, sign into a few things, and over time everything ends up living in the same place. Work email, personal email, saved passwords, random tabs that never really close. It’s not intentional — it just slowly happens.

I usually notice this when I’m looking over someone sholder helping with something else, or it is one of those items I bring up when trying to understand people or teams pain points at work. It’s rarely raised as a problem on its own. It’s just part of how they’ve been working.

Most of the time they’re using a single browser setup for everything. Work tools, personal Gmail, personal logins — all mixed together.

And to be fair, it works… until it starts to feel annoying.

People talk about getting logged out more than they expect, links opening the wrong account, or just feeling unsure which email or login they’re actually using. Nothing is completely broken — it’s just harder than it needs to be.

When I walk through a cleaner way of setting things up, it’s usually a bit of a lightbulb moment.

What I tend to suggest is keeping work and personal browsing clearly separate. Not in a complicated or locked-down way — just enough structure to avoid the mess.

On a work laptop in a Microsoft 365 environment, I keep it very simple:

• Edge for work
• Chrome for personal

That’s the setup I use myself and the one I show other people, because it’s easy to understand and easy to remember.

Edge is signed into my work account and used for things like email, SharePoint, Teams, and internal tools. Chrome is where personal email, personal logins, and everyday browsing live.

Once it’s set up this way, most of the little frustrations fade away. You don’t have to think about which account you’re in, and things behave much more predictably.

The checklist I walk people through

When I’m helping someone set this up, this is roughly the checklist I use:

• Decide which browser is work and which is personal
• Sign into your work account only in the work browser
• Sign into your personal email only in the personal browser
• Move any personal bookmarks into the personal browser
• Check saved passwords and clean up anything that’s in the wrong place
• Set each browser as a separate dock or taskbar icon so they’re easy to tell apart
• From now on, open work links in the work browser and personal links in the personal one

That’s usually enough to clean things up without overthinking it.

It’s a small change, but it makes using a work laptop feel calmer and more straightforward. Not perfect — just easier.