How to clean off your desk in 15 minutes or less

Ready?

Move your chair - If you’re seated, you might be likely to check email or get distracted. So move your chair away from your desk. Stand in front of your desk and give yourself a big picture view.

Set?

Get a timer – Whether it’s lemon-shaped or on your phone, set it for 15 minutes.

Go!

Rev your engine and start moving. Only pick up one thing at a time and then make a decision about where it should go – recycling, garbage, files, mail, etc.

• Toss (recycle) anything you haven’t looked at in over a month and/or “might need someday”. Chances are good you can find it online. So let it go.
• Put like things together. Just make a small pile until you decide where they should go. A client of mine found she had 6 separate peices of paper with leads she wanted to follow up on. Putting them together helped her figure out what to with them next.
• If something only takes a few minutes to complete (like putting a date in your calendar), do it while you’re cleaning so you don’t have to pick it up again later.

Stop when the timer goes off – and you’ll have a neater desk at the end. If you want to keep working, go for it, but I recommend giving yourself a break (and a pat on the back). You can plan another 15 minutes later on.

C’mon, you’re just perusing the internet right now. You’ve got 15 minutes, don’t you? Go ahead – stand up and push your chair back. It’s not so hard – and you’ll feel sooo much better when you’re done.