Do you often wonder what’s in the boxes and other containers in your office, work room, storage area or even your shop?  Have you spent considerable time sorting through non see-through containers for items you want. 
Even when the containers are marked, you don’t see at first glance what’s in there.
What about, whenever possible, using see-through plastic jars, and bins, glass containers and even wire baskets so you can quickly determine what’s at your fingertips.  Also, as you look around your work area and have your supplies where you can see them, you might gain inspiration.
Do you use see-through containers for …read more

When you’re organizing your space, it’s easy to get overwhelmed. There are a lot of choices out there. Just a quick glance into The Container Store can give you more options than you ever thought were possible.
So how do you decide what to use? There are binders, magazine files, stacking trays, vertical desktop organizers, file cabinets, shoe boxes, regular boxes.
First, you need to look at your needs. What types of items do you plan to store? For how long?
What items do you have on hand? Will they work for your storage needs? Just because a magazine file is made for …read more

I was reading a post over at Web Worker Daily about email. In it, they discuss two types of email users – filers and finders.
The filers use lots of folders to categorize and file away their email. I can remember doing this in Outlook. You see, Outlook’s search function is terrible. So I would file by project or department or whatever seemed appropriate at the time.
Unfortunately, when it came to finding those emails, it wasn’t always easy to remember where I filed it. Was it by project A? Or department B? Or did I put it in the folder where …read more

File drawers are nice for organizing your files and keeping things off of your desktop. But sometimes you need a file accessible and easy to grab. If you have a project that you’re constantly working on, looking things up, adding bits of paper to the file, referring to notes, you need that file at hand. If you have to retrieve it from a drawer multiple times a day, it can get irritating and also slow you down.
Yet you don’t necessarily want to leave it lying on your desktop either. It could get covered up. Things could get knocked out of …read more

(myorganizedbiz.com) – I just recently finished a long-term project. As I was clearing out my office, I gathered all of my notebooks together. There were seven of them, representing notes from meetings, phone calls, and brainstorming sessions. As I tossed them in the shredder bin, I thought about all of the time and work they represented. It felt a little strange to be getting rid of it all, even though I will have no further use for any of the info (and much of it was confidential anyway).
I forgot how dependent I was on those notebooks. I took a regular …read more

(myorganizedbiz.com) – So we talk a lot about the virtues of a clean or uncluttered desk. How a nice, clean desk will help you be more productive, help you find things more quickly, polish your car, and shine your shoes. Okay, maybe not the last two.
But do you really need a clean desk? Can a desk have a lot of ’stuff’ on it, neatly organized into categories?
I’m wondering what ways people work best. For some, it’s a minimalist desk: computer, phone, notepad. For others, it’s a desk with tons of pictures and knick knacks. Or maybe everything from a …read more

(www.myorganizedbiz.com) – One of my desk drawers is rapidly becoming a junk drawer. Oh, it didn’t start out that way, but over time it has become a sort of catch-all for the things I don’t know what to do with.
The drawer contains a bunch of cords that I know I need for various electronic devices. Software for my laptop and desktop. Extra sharpies. My iPod shuffle. Extra earphones. Battery chargers. There may even be some other items lurking under the mess.
So this week, I’m going to conquer this drawer. I plan to empty it completely and start over. First, …read more

(www.myorganizedbiz.com) – One thing I hate about office equipment is the power cords. More specifically, the monstrous adapter plugs that they come with. Even if you have a 5-plug power strip, you can usually manage to use only 2 or 3 because of those massive adapters.
I’ve been frustrated with this for a long time, needing 2 or 3 power strips when I should only need one. But not too long ago, I discovered a pretty darn-near perfect solution to this mess: the PowerSquid.
The PowerSquid Outlet Multiplier takes away the normal power strip and instead gives you five flexible outlets connected …read more

(www.myorganizedbiz.com) – I stumbled across an article on Apartment Therapy about creating a table of contents for your filing cabinet. The writer suggested that you make a list of files in the order in which they appear in your cabinet and then attach it to the outside of your cabinet. The theory was that it will help you know where to look for an important file.
Honestly, I think that may be a little bit of overkill. Unless you have a lot of filing cabinets, is this really necessary? Most of us have one or two – maybe even three – …read more

(www.myorganizedbiz.com) – Do you regularly back up your computer files? You don’t? Have you thought about how that can negatively affect your business and your productivity?
A fellow freelancer found out the hard way when her new MacBook had a catastrophic disk failure and she lost all of her data. Since she’s a writer, she not only lost all of her writing, but her billing data, invoices, contracts, and e-mails.
All gone.