I’ve been inspired by a long-term relationship into which I have fallen head-first – with an unmerciful winter cold.  Since the start of the month, there has hardly been a night where I haven’t felt like I’m not suffocating from congestion or that I could not actually cough up my toes.  I’ve tried medication, soup, tea, vaporizers and “rest” (but who can rest like this?).  I’m just plain weary.  You get the point – I know you’ve been there yourself.

All this is not enough to cancel everything and stay in bed, yet it is enough to have me staring like a deer into headlights at my computer screen, as it taunts me for another creative endeavor.  Not a chance.

Most people have a time of day during which their energy and creativity run slightly lower.  That’s the best time for routine work and “tidying up” projects.  Going on my fourth week of this seemingly interminable state, what can I do to make the most of my low energy time?

1. Take care of simple routine work that may have been placed on the back burner back when I was shooting creativity fireworks.  Renewed professional associations and subscriptions.  Bought a new printer online.

2. Delegate anything I can to keep the ball rolling. This can mean hiring a virtual assistant to keep my routine admin up to date, or to take care of the holiday mailing which, unfortunately, seems moot by now (mea culpa).

3.  Simply forget about unessential tasks that won’t be delegated. I can’t hire a concierge service to do all the routine personal tasks that normally leave me only slightly dizzy.  The house won’t look spic and spam, we’ll eat rotisserie chicken and bagged salad for as long as it takes, the kids will watch more movies than usual (they won’t mind) and “keep in touch” meetings are whittled down to a bare minimum.

4. Use an out of office message for part of the day, even every day.  Consolidate return correspondence into a time when I’m not seeing double.

With this combination of delegation and self-preservation, my productivity should maintain a forward-moving momentum without sacrificing sanity or well-being.  Do you have a productivity secret?  Please share it with us in the comment space below!

Wishing you healthy, productive and meaningful holidays!

This Rhymes with Orange comic was published in last Sunday’s paper, and has since spread like wildfire through Professional Organizer list serves and emails. If you can relate to this, we need to talk.

On a more *professional* note, there are two things I want to point out in this comic, which demonstrate the artist’s keen understanding of office (dis)organization.

1. It makes perfect sense that there would be stuff all over the place, since there’s nowhere to put any of it away.  In real life, this office needs some shelves and filing cabinets, and/or a Fujistu Scansnap and a good shredder.  OR,

2. This may raise some eyebrows in the crowd, but I hold that if the *floorganization* is neutral or good for the user’s productivity, is not dangerous (see fire code), and it doesn’t bother him/her or other people involved – than it may not require fixing.

Today’s Facitlity Manager blog takes a look at how and why piling works for some people as a productivity tool.  It’s a science called (get this) Cognitive Ergonomics.  Click here to read the post.

Last Sunday morning, I woke up fine, but my laptop did not.  It would start, then crash.  Start, crash.  After a day of troubleshooting, I realized I would have to face the facts: time to reset the monster to factory settings.  My trusted laptop repair specialist Sam Sato, of Leading Technology Micro, Inc. confirmed (thanks for the freebie, Sam!).

I tell you now I have neither shed tears nor lost a moment’s sleep over this crash.  Even during the relatively long file restoration process (in the Age of Immediate, 7 hours is an eternity), I was somewhat inconvenienced – at best.

There’s a link to MOZY.com in the Resources section of the sidebar.  The best way to safeguard your information is to schedule automatic backups.  Although the first 2GB are free, they are quickly used up, especially if you include lots of music and image files.  To take full advantage of MOZY.com’s generosity, you may consider only backing up files that are “irreplaceable” or very hard to find again.

My New Year’s wish for you is that you’ll treat yourself to the gift of digital peace of mind and subscribe to an online backup service.   After all, productivity starts with not wasting your time in the first place.

Wishing you a productive and meaningful New year!

There is no shortage of information available on procrastination.  Amazon.com lists 50 titles of self-help books addressing different aspects of procrastination.  Now, if I’m late on a project deadline, the last thing I need is to snuggle in with a book.

I’d like to empower you by telling you that not procrastinating is entirely a matter of decision.  That is to say, procrastination is a result of indecision, more than anything else. Fear, fatigue, perfectionism, disorganization, poor time management, discomfort, and distractions make decision making even harder, but the bottom line is adopting a mind over matter attitude is your first step towards success.  You are in charge.

People do who don’t procrastinate are usually great at intellectualizers. They instinctively pave over excuses with practical solutions, and so quickly they don’t even know they’re doing it.   But, for many people this is a conscious process.  I don’t believe that people who don’t procrastinate don’t experience fear, fatigue, perfectionism, disorganization, discomfort, and distractions.  However, they don’t let these things stand in their way.

Coaching is a great vehicle for help in decision making. Rather than analyse your fears and challenges, coaching works with your self-awareness to develop decision-making steps that are right for you.

Evernote and Shoeboxed have put an end to the universal struggle of managing receipts and business cards.  Even I, professional organizer, had a pocket of business cards in my work bag, waiting to be made useful…

Until now!  I’m pretty sure the only easier way than this is chuck the papers in the trash and not bother at all.

And a big “thank you!” the nice folks at Shoeboxed, Evernote and Pixily for producing such awesome YouTube how-to’s.

Click on the title above to watch Evernote’s YouTube video!

Don’t know where to start or how to go about using Evernote in a way that fits your work?

ARoundTuit Organizing Virtual Services are available nation-wide to get you going!

Contact me today to find out why everyone is raving about Evernote!

Will Google Voice be the end of voice mail as we know it?  No more waiting to be in a quiet place, or to have a pen that works to write down messages?  No more struggling to catch just the key information?

Google Voice is the planned upgrade from www.grandcentral.com – Google’s one-stop-shop for Google technology on your mobile phone.  According to the Google Voice website, the app will be available shortly.  If you want to be notified of it’s arrival, just enter your e-mail address on the Google Voice Invite Page.

In the meantime, here’s the article You Have No New Messages – Ever by Slate.com’s Farhad Manjoo, where Manjoo talks about the declining usefulness of voicemail in a world of expanding communication options, at the same time as a desperate need of simplification.

And here’s some Google Voice ammo from the NY Times, “You’ve Got Voicemail, But Do You Care?” about how voice mail has lost it’s faithful following to e-mail, text messaging, and even social media sites like Facebook.

So my question is, with the new technology, and in the interest of increasing office productivity and simplifying communication, are we ready to do away with voice mail?

The jury is still out on that one, probably.  What do you think?  Please comment!

Whomever has had the burden of scheduling a meeting with several participants knows it’s like herding cats.  And then there came TimeBridge, the ultimate online scheduling assistant.  “So easy”, says Demogirl.com “it’s disgusting”.

Watch the TimeBridge screencast demo!  It’s only a few minutes long.

“TimeBridge has introduced the first Personal Scheduling Assistant designed to help busy people find a time to meet — fast. This innovative, new web application works across calendaring systems, companies and time zones.”

Yes, I am a big fan of not doing work that does not need to be done, or can be delegated to a computer (which will never resent it like a co-worker who actually had in mind to leave early that day).

Wishing you a meaningful and productive weekend,

Lauren

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 habits you can take on right now:

• Determine each day’s priorities the night before. (5 minutes)
• Review the day’s plan first thing. (5 minutes)
• Call instead of emailing for complicated questions. (5-10 minutes)
• Leave detailed messages to avoid phone or email tag. (30-60 seconds)
• Keep personal and work emails in separate accounts.
• Take frequent breaks from computer and phone work to relax and stretch. (5 minutes several times)

The good news: The best productivity solutions consist of simple habits that could save you hours every week of work (or aimless procrastination).

The bad news: You’ll have to get used to less clutter, rushing around, stress and fatigue.  But, I think you can handle that!

Watch this great demo with Prasad Thimmeneini, CEO and Founder of Pixily. If you think it’s a great idea, but don’t know where to start in your piles and piles of paper (yes, I know), just drop me a line to talk about it.

Easy as 1-2-Pixily!