Most everyone needs a functional spot to serve as a home office, but it often ends up the dumping ground for excess paperwork and other things we just don’t know what to do with. A disorganized office can result in late payments on bills, overbuying, and lots of anxiety. Whether you operate a business from home, or just need an organized spot to process personal papers, think through the following list as you’re sorting and arranging – you’ll save yourself time, money and stress:
1.    DON’T stack things. Piles of magazines, books, and paperwork will just continue to grow until you haven’t the foggiest notion of what’s there from the middle down.
2.    DO use vertical space. Use file folders and a vertical file sorter to house your bills, receipts, action items, etc. LABEL the files. Purge magazines older than three months. Better yet, see if your favorites are available online and ditch a few subscriptions.
3.    DON’T save every single piece of paper. Although some papers are key and need to be stored indefinitely, statistics show that 80% of what we file we never look at again.
4.    DO search for and find a reasonable document retention guideline, such as this one from usa.gov. You can also check with your accountant, attorney or financial advisor about what to keep and what to shred.
5.    DON’T get excited and buy tons of extra supplies. So what if dry erase markers ARE on sale BOGO at the office supply store? It’s not a bargain if you never use it. Not only does buying too much waste money, it takes up valuable space.
6.    DO make a list, calendar regular visits to the store, and buy only what you need for a month to six weeks. Use a closet or storage cabinet for some extra supplies, and arrange them so that they can be easily labeled and seen.
7.    DON’T just throw everything into the desk drawers and fill them to capacity. What you can’t see, you won’t use, and that’s the real definition of wasted space.
8. DO put your most-frequently used supplies in the drawer, in a labeled drawer tray. Keep it down to one layer of items, so that you don’t have to go digging to find what you need.
Getting organized in the office isn’t so tough if you have a plan and commit to it. You will spend a lot of time in this space, so make it as pleasant and easy to work in as possible.
Thanks to Sara Skillen for our organizing tips. Â Sara will be having a “Spring Organizing -Motivation and Strategy” Â class to be held at the Williamson County Public Library on March 24th at 6:30 pm or you can visit www.skillsetorganizing.com for more information.
photo credit:pixgood.com
