ARoundTuit Organizing & Productivity

There’s a story of two travelers cruising on the highway:

The passenger says, “I think we’re lost.”

The driver replies, “We are lost, but we’re making great time!”

Productivity is not about doing things faster.  It’s about choosing the right actions (or inactions, sometimes!) to get you where you want to go.  Obviously, the first step is trip planning is to know your destination.

I love helping people get clear on their big picture, by asking how they can be most effective in the different roles they play, at work and at home.  By … Continue Reading

High-value habits require very little effort for significant results. Perhaps one of the best examples of this is planning a day’s work the night before.  Sean D’Souza of Psychotactics summed it up brilliantly (I must say) in his blog post Three Minutes That Save Three Hours.

Also, storing frequently used items on the side of your dominant hand. This makes retrieval instant and replacement convenient = far more likely to occur.  This is a high-value organization habit, believe it or not.

Here are some prize … Continue Reading

“I bet this is the worst mess you’ve ever seen”, you say. “Not by far”, I say, and close the subject.

But then, what do I think when I enter an office (or an entire building) full of clutter?  In-boxes filled with hundreds of unread emails? Months and months of unopened office mail?

Or,when I meet a talented professional who’s disorganization is hurting his or her career?

In most cases, these thoughts come  to mind:

1. Your are under a lot of stress. It is eating away

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Here are the three killer questions I ask clients to help them take action against clutter:

Do you need it?

In this category fall the many types of document a business is required to keep for a limited period of time, and some not at all.  Digital files are now acceptable in many instances, which allows you to move the originals off-site, or even destroy them (WHAT?!).  Also in this category are some types of statements and invoices.

Ask a CPA or visit www.irs.gov for the latest on document retention requirements and recommendations for your type … Continue Reading

Organizing is to productivity as the heart is to the body: a driving force when efficiently maintained, or a source of anxiety and pain when neglected.  Be that what it is, a person isn’t a just a heart.  There is a system of organs, muscles and bones that make vital contributions to a person’s sickness or health.

A good professional organizer looks at the organizing project as part of a whole system, including other areas, tasks, people, and dynamics.

Without knowing this, it’s understandable why clients ask organizers for a quick fix – grant it, sometimes that’s all it takes.  Now … Continue Reading

Problem: MIA purse / wallet / sunglasses / earpiece / security card / PDA.

Professional Organizers know to choose a home for such “mobile” necessities.  This is something people understand right away.  So, they choose a “safe” place, like their top dresser drawer, or the overburdened kitchen counter.  But items still go missing.  Humph.

“Assigning a home hasn’t helped”, they bemoan.  “I must be hopelessly disorganized”.

Not so, not so.  Assigning a home is only half the equation.  The other essential half is that the home be convenient.  “Convenient” means on the flight path to your usual first stop once you enter the house.  In most … Continue Reading

Professional Organizers help people by redesigning aspects of their surroundings, possessions and time to allow for a more productive and meaningful existence.

In the workplace, Professional Organizers can:

• Bring structure, logic and control to your organization, at any level.
• Optimize work flow to increase productivity, reduce stress and heighten profitability.
• Build company-wide systems or define responsibilities for a single employee.
• Motivate your team with real solutions to the everyday challenges of too much to do, changing priorities, and information overload. NAPO, copyright 2006.

ARoundTuit is

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I’m going to go out on a limb and blog about an item not related to office productivity – at least not directly. It’s because I care about you, and I know how much you or someone you really care about is irritated by those big boxes of unsorted photos hidden in your guestroom closet. Yes, the ones you have been meaning to take care of for.. years.

How did I know about them if I’ve never met you or been to your home? Because the overwhelming majority of people I’ve ever met have at least one box of unsorted photos … Continue Reading

Thanks to a resourceful coaching client, I recently discovered www.Toodledo.com: which is essentially an on-line to do list on steroids.  This thing can prioritize, it can sort, it can synch with Outlook, Google calendar.  You can SEND IT new items using Blackberry and iPhone technology, JOTT and even TWITTER!  Get this: you can format the lists to print out such that you can fold them into a little book.  If only it did … Continue Reading