5 Quick Tips for Organizing Paperwork
Ready to get the paper clutter under control in your office, but don’t have the time for a complete office overhaul? There are simple strategies to organizing paperwork that you can implement today and you’ll see immediate results. Here are this Professional Organizer in NYC’s go-to tips.
Don’t file every single paper that comes across your desk. Many of these items don’t qualify for file cabinet space! Instead of saving every piece of paper, just save the information that you need. Add tasks to your to-do list and important dates or meetings to your calendar and then recycle the paper that delivered this information. Discard junk mail, advertisements you aren’t interested in, and any document that isn’t relevant to your work projects and tasks.
File paperwork right away. As new documents cross your desk, file them as soon as you process them. Don’t pile them on top of the files that are already scattered around your office. You’ll never dig out if you keep adding to the problem! Get into the habit of filing immediately after you are done with a document or schedule 5-10 minutes at the end of your workday to tackle your filing.
Store reference and archive files elsewhere. This includes past client files or projects that have been finished, tax files that need to be saved, and any other file that is not relevant to your current workload but still needs to be kept. Take some time and put all the reference files in a less accessible file drawer like the bottom one and the archive files in a storage box or tote and move them to a storage closet.
Don’t get print happy. It’s not necessary to print out every email that is sent to you! You can organize your email folders to properly store important emails that you may need to reference at a later time. Use that option instead of printing. There are times when you might need to print something and that’s okay! Sometimes you may need a hard copy printout as reference and for making notes while working on a task. However, once the task is done, this reference isn’t usually needed and can be trashed.
Declutter in small increments. Instead of tackling your entire office, book a meeting with yourself in smaller chunks of time. Focus on sorting and filing the overflowing papers that have been collecting around your workspace. Set your timer for 10 minutes and dive in. Once the timer goes off, get back to work.
Paper organizing can feel overwhelming, but you don’t need to overhaul your entire office space in one sitting in order to reap the benefits! Use these quick paper organizing tips and start enjoying the results. When you are ready for that complete paperwork overhaul, call this Professional Organizer in NYC to help you out.