Need help organizing a small workspace?

Small workspaces and offices can be challenging. But you’ll likely be surprised at the many benefits of organizing a small workspace in your overall productivity and life balance.

Organizing a small workspace – or even cleaning a small workspace – can be challenging for sure.

One of the questions I get asked from students, renters, and people who – for whatever reason – are residing in a dwelling where they cannot make significant changes is, “How do I organize this?”

My passion is organization – how to be more organized – and specifically, organizing workspaces.

When our workspace is free of clutter, inspiring and functional, we are able to be more productive and this translates into many other areas of our lives.

In this example, the temporary workspace belongs to a renter of a furnished home. Without the ability to really take out furniture, paint or even hang things on the wall, this person found themselves uninspired and definitely not functional.

My focus is to help people clean things up on basically any budget and as you will see in the steps outlined below, the entire project cost under $100 and turned a dull workspace into something much more user-friendly while this individual figures out what their next moves are.

Step One – Organize Paper

This is perhaps the most daunting of tasks. Receipts, forms, mailings, bills and other paper tends to be a pariah in the lives of most people.

It is seductive to become apathetic about paper and let things build up. My organization students tend to have a deluge of paper when they start the class and after getting things straightened have found checks, lost business receipts and more.

I suggest sorting paper into the following categories:

1. Shred – anything that has your name and address, hotel keys, business receipts over seven years (check with your CPA on this one as it varies in states, provinces and countries), any past-their-time school forms that may have your child’s name on them,
2. Recycle – anything that is generic – think store flyers, expired coupons, notices that do not have anyone’s name on them, old materials that are no longer relevant.
3. File – any business receipts, children’s school records, veterinary records for pets, home repair receipts, automobile repair receipts.
4. Post – any current notifications for events or anything that requires immediate action. These can be pinned to a cork board or posted in clear view.

I recommend using clear, zip, plastic envelopes available at Office Max™ and Staples™. These are great because you can see what is in them. If you have a filing cabinet, receipts can be filed or, I prefer binder filing, as it is less messy.

Using a CLOUD SYSTEM is also great. Scanning receipts and uploading them to an online storage facility is fantastic. At Step Into Your Power™ we recommend using Sandy Botkin’s Tax Bot AP for Android and IPhone. www.taxplan.taxbot.com .

Sorting paper can take a few hours, or a few days. It can be an onerous task so put on some of your favorite music and have fun with it. Once the paper is sorted it is easy to maintain.

Next week I will share the next steps to getting this space organized and more inspired for the owner.

If you would like me to make recommendations on your workspace email me a photo at submissions@susansly.com  – please insert subject line ‘office clean up’.

Lastly – remember that no matter how disorganized you are, getting organized comes down to one step at a time. We would love to also see your before and after photos so send those in too.

Let’s get organized!

Susan

Susan is a balanced living expert.  She is an author, speaker and self made millionaire.  She has appeared on ABC Family, the CBN, written for Dianne Magazine, Oxygen Australia and many more.  Susan dedicates time to philanthropy and projects that benefit women and girls all over the world.  She is married to her best friend, Chris, and together they have five beautiful children.