Organize Your Desk
by: Shawn La'Vista Jones
If you’re anything like me, your desktop can go from super clean and organized to a cluttered disaster zone due to business and organizational neglect. With that being said, I wanted to provide a few quick tips on how to get your desk organized, and keep it that way.
Start with a clean slate
Move everything currently on your desk, off your desk! Once this is done, sort through items that can be pitched, relocated and filed away for future use.
Categorize your paper
Now that you’ve sorted through all the paperwork on your desk, separate them into ‘like’ piles and create binders or folders to file away and store your documents. When filing items away be sure to use a categorizing system that makes sense to you and keep it simple! If the system you put in place is too complicated or complex, you won’t use it.
Make filing a habit
Now that you have a designated place for invoices, marketing templates, client info, etc., make it a habit to file away your paper documents on a regular basis to avoid it from piling up on your desk.
Give everything a home
Now that you’ve sorted through all the various items that were on your desk, it’s time to start putting things back … key things. If there is something you use every single day, it should be easier to access than something you only need once a week or once a month. Arrange essential items on your desk based on usefulness and not aesthetics only. Every item you put back on your desk needs to be assigned a permanent home; whenever you use that item be sure to put it back in it’s place when your done with it.
Stay organized as you go
Just like going to the gym once isn’t going to keep your body in shape, organizing your desk just once isn’t going to keep it neat and tidy. Make it a rule to take just 5 minutes at the end of your workday to straighten your desk and put everything back in its designated place. Exercising this discipline will allow you avoid re-organizing a huge mess all at once.