I found your service to be perfect for me. You helped me find the best use of a limited cubicle space & custom designed a solution for it. The thing that helped the most was the system for managing my paper flow. It is an easy process to follow so I don't avoid it now! Thank you for helping me achieve my goals at work.
Aaron Venable
Ft. Lauderdale, FL

Do you have a office organizing tip that has helped you and would like to share it with us? E-mail your organizing tip along with your name, city, and state. My tip is...

First things first. Don't read everything you've collected when you're behind the eight ball. Prioritize the list and proceed that way. Another idea is to file the reading in the file it pertains to so that if it comes up it is all together.

Get personal. There are quick news features on CNN and MSNBC that allow customization of the stories you want to hear.

Redesign post-its. Little yellow squares should not replace a calendar or daily planner. If you have more than 5 hanging, they lose their alert status. Try putting them on papers that go in your action file (or pile), on reading material or other things you need to take care of later. When you do there will be no forgetting exactly what you were to do or why you saved something.

Outline flow. To really get a handle on processes in your business, write out the many steps in your cycle for each customer. You can do this for almost any repetitive process. Use the data to streamline the efforts or laminate the sheet to have it handy for training, accuracy or quick review.

Use broad categories. Create files that begin with general categories (vendors, payables, insurance) and work down to more specific subcategories (names of vendors, power company, auto, life.) This system will help you find things more quickly since it is how our brains actually retain data.

Do the right job. There is a difference between doing the job right and doing the right job. To be truly effective you must do the right job.

Be effective first. Effectiveness comes before efficiency. Once you know exactly what the right job is and what is required to accomplish that task, then is the time to focus on efficiency.

Create extraordinary results. Do the right task with the best process using the most effective tools and the results will be extraordinary.

Identify key result activities. Before working on any task ask yourself if you will be closer to achieving the overall mission of the company once the task is completed. If the answer is yes the task you have chosen is a key result activity.

Begin with the end in mind. Set a goal before starting a job and you will have a much greater chance of success.