Dr. Judi Craig, MCC
Executive Coach
Dr. Judi Craig, MCC Executive Coach |
|
|
Getting
Organized (SA
Woman, 2003) Look around your office.
Do you see stacks of papers on your desk, bookshelves, credenza—even,
Heaven forbid—the floor? Does
you computer look like a kite that’s about to take off because you have so
many sticky notes attached to it as your reminder not to forget something (of
course, after the fifth one, you never even look at them!)? Now you may be saying to yourself “But I can find anything
I need, so what’s the problem?” Well, studies show that sometimes you can’t.
Even if you do find what you’re looking for, it typically takes much
longer than it does for people who have a well-organized office. But that’s not the main reason to get organized.
Truth is, having stacks of work around you results in a psychological
feeling of overwhelm. A friend
calls with a last-minute lunch invitation to hear a great speaker; are you
likely to accept with all that visible evidence of work unfinished?
Probably not. So you can miss
out on a lot of opportunities. (Maybe
you would have met your next big client). Worse
yet, you never truly feel “finished” at the end of the day. And what about your professional image?
Are your clients and/or employees likely to look around and think “Gee,
I wonder if my stuff will get lost?”
Let’s face it, the mess is not likely to inspire I know. Some of
you are thinking “But for me, out of sight is out of mind; I need to have So you decide to take a day (or two) and get organized.
Where do you start? First, get a box of leaf bags and fill them with all the
things you no longer need. This
includes Next, take a look at your office arrangement.
Is your desk where you want it to be?
How about After doing whatever rearranging makes sense, look at
what’s “out” that shouldn’t be. Do
you need more file cabinets? Shelves?
Storage boxes? Are there changes you would like to make to your filing
system? Don’t despair—you
don’t have Now consider where your files are located.
What files do you really need in your office?
Can some be stored elsewhere in the building?
The files you refer to daily need to be within reach while you are
at your desk. This would include a
“messages” file, perhaps one marked “urgent”,
reference lists (phone numbers of employees, menus from places where you
order lunch), personal items (your kid’s soccer schedule—maybe the Spurs’
schedule?), perhaps current projects or client files.
Items that you are not using daily but are still current can be placed in
file cabinets elsewhere in the room. If
you just have to have something left out, then place it in a file sorter on your
desk or nearby space. The idea is that you want to arrive at your office every day
and see nothing on your desk Okay, so you clean everything up and get your office looking
spiffy. You fixed the problem—but
you haven’t resolved it. Your
office will look the way it did before in a week or two unless you create a system
to maintain the changes. The
simplest is to take the last five minutes before you leave your office for the
day and put everything in its place. Viola!
One final thing: Once you’ve done all that hard work, why
not celebrate by purchasing something for your office that will remind you of
your accomplishment? Whether it is a
six-dollar mouse pad
Judi
Craig, Ph.D., MCC
is an Executive & Career Coach in |
|
Send mail to gradysan@austin.rr.com with
questions or comments about this web site.
|
