Nov 25

“Organize for Success”: Conquer Your Paper Chaos! On the Road & In the Office

By Sherry Borsheim Uncategorized No Comments

“Organize for Success”

Conquer Your Paper Chaos!

On the Road & In the Office

When you’re on the road for work, do you have a system to keep you organized? If your current system involves stuffing your briefcase full of expense receipts, phone messages, meeting notes, business cards and research materials, your business would greatly benefit from a slightly different approach.

Below are my top three tips for staying organized and enjoying your travel time:

1. Clutter is Deferred Decisions

As you are probably well aware, the stuffed briefcase method can be a disaster when you return to the office. That pile of paper that you dump out of your briefcase is just postponed decisions waiting to eat up even more of your valuable time! With that in mind, remember that half of the battle with paper pile-up is deciding what to do with it when you first encounter the item.

When you are tempted to defer a decision about a specific piece of paper, ask yourself, “What am I going to know tomorrow that I don’t know today?” If the answer is “nothing”, make the decision right away and move on to more important decisions!

2. Organized Follow Up Equals Success

One of the most critical components to business success is follow up. Taking control of your paper chaos and making a decision about each piece of paper enables you to efficiently follow up.

Following up after being on the road is extremely important and fairly simple to do if you keep organized while you travel.

3. Use a Travel Case to Stay Organized on the Road

When I’m on the road, I use a hard plastic pocket file with 13 pocket files with tabs. This letter size filing case has a zipper across the top and enables me to keep all my paper organized without even thinking about it.

This travel case is easy to carry and fits nicely into most briefcases. I create similar “Action Tabs” in the travel case to mirror my “Tickler Permanent Actions Files” that’s in my office. (If you don’t know about my Tickler Permanent Action Files system, please contact me. It’s a tool that has worked miracles in the lives of many of my clients).

When I get back to the office after a long day on the road, I simply remove the contents from my travel case and put into the Tickler system. Everything is waiting and organized for follow up the next day.

For example, when I collect business cards at a meeting or convention, I slip them into the “Data Entry” tab. When I get back to the office, I just transfer the contents of that tab into my existing Tickler Data Entry file. When it comes to the data entry part of my day, everything is easy to reach in my file.

EXTRA Great Travel Tips

Before you leave on a trip, reserve an appointment with yourself for just after returning and take time to go through each of the files in your briefcase and act on them (file, toss, call, contact, mail, data entry, write, submit receipts, etc.).
Carry stationery to write thank-you notes or other quick responses while you are on the road. Also, keep postage and blank envelopes in here.
Keep expense reimbursement or tax-deductible receipts together in your “Expense Reimburse” file.
Keep Post-it Notes in your briefcase so you can write down the next action step to take once you have read something. Also, keep a highlighter pen with you to highlight important information. This will reduce the amount of time you waste re-reading materials to figure out why you decided to keep something and what you decided to do next.
Make a list of specific ideas you plan to implement when you return home, and keep this in your “Tasks” file. Prioritize the list at the end of your trip, and enter reminders of actions you plan to take on your calendar.

Time to Hit the Road

If you follow these steps when you travel, you will be able to make real use of all the information you have collected rather than having a pile of postponed decisions waiting for your attention.

For more information about staying organized while you travel or to order your travel case, contact me at 604-233-7076 or email me at info@simplyproductive.com. I can assist you in creating an efficient paper management system and can tame your unruly papers with The Paper Tiger and a customized Tickler file system.

Action Challenge:

Now it’s your turn. Take a moment and ask yourself, what is your biggest challenge when organizing your day on the road?

Now that you know what your challenge is, what is one action step you will take to ease the challenge when out of the office?

I’d love to hear from you, so please email your “Action Challenge” to me and I can be your accountability partner.

Mar 31

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Organizing Your Tax Files

By Sherry Borsheim Blog, Free Articles, Home Office Organization, Quick Organizing Tips No Comments

Organize Your Tax Files

It’s almost that time of year again– tax time. As the clock counts down, it’s apparent that the only way to tackle this unavoidable task is by taking an organized approach.

If you haven’t already developed a strategy to eliminate last minute panic, doing so should top your list of priorities, right after you get through the current tax time crunch.

Start off by contacting your accountant to learn what critical information you need to include with your tax return, such as documents to support wages or other income received. Once you know what you’re looking for, collect all the records you need to file your return. Then create your own checklist to use year after year at tax time.

Next, batch or group like tax files together and place in file folders or use binder clips. Here are some file suggestions:

Provincial or State taxes (HST)
Donation Receipts
Accounts Receivables Collected
Accounts Payables / Paid Bills
Credit Card Receipts
Bank related items – bank statements, cheque stubs, and receipts
Tax Deductions
Investments, etc.

If you need to correlate your expenses with your calendar, put the receipts in chronological order in envelopes in the appropriate file. Make note of what should be in chronological order for next year and do it as you go to save time organizing tax files.

Now you’re ready to take the information to your accountant or enter the information into the tax form yourself. If you’re doing it yourself, consider using a computer program that double checks the return to ensure you’re getting all the deductions you deserve.

To make tax time a little easier next year, consider these tips to organize tax files:

– Use one credit card for business to make it easier to track tax-deductible items

– Use your Paper Tiger software to create locations to keep all tax relevant information at your fingertips.

– Look into a computer program that manages financial information like Quickbooks or Simply Accounting

Schedule a date in your calendar for next year to prepare your taxes earlier. You checklist will be done and at your fingertips!

What tricks do you have to organize your tax files?

Mar 05

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Desk Organization: 5 Tips for an Uncluttered Desk

By Sherry Borsheim Blog, Business Organizing, Home Office Organization, Organizing Paper Files No Comments

Desk Organization Tips to Clear Your Office Clutter

It’s the time of year again when we begin moving outdoors, taking in the crisp fresh air, and feeling a real sense of renewal!

And having your home and workspace organized helps immensely to welcome that wonderful freshness back into your life.

Check in with your Goals

Now is also the perfect time to assess where you’re standing with the commitments and goals you made to yourself in January.

Did you set out to be more active this year?

Be on time for meetings and stay ahead of deadlines?

Or maybe you set out to be better organized by finding great desk organization solutions?

Take a close look at your workspace and honestly answer these 3 questions:

Where are the piles accumulating?
What items don’t have a home?
Is your Inbox on your computer overflowing with 100’s or even 1000’s of emails?
Am I still in desperate need of office organization tips?

Your answers to these key questions will give you the clues for where you should start with these desk organization tips for your spring cleaning.

Why Wait to Spring Clean?

Welcome in the fresh air and get a head start this year
with our free Ultimate Spring Cleaning Checklist!

Download Here!

With these tips below, I recommend tackling one or two per day as to not overwhelm yourself right off the bat. It may start to feel really easy and freeing but remember to ration your energy so you can keep motivated and get your organizing done all week!

Most people only use 20 percent of what they have, 80 percent of the time. So with that in mind, let’s get moving and clear up your workspace!

Desk Organization Tips in 5 Easy Steps

Tip 1: Start with the Visible Piles First!

Period.

We can’t get to what we can’t even reach yet!

With our goal being to make a dramatic, visible result, we need to start with the visible things first.

Tip 2: Always Work in One Area at a Time

The goal here is to clear Command Central and create dramatic, visible results immediately. Starting with the top of your desk first.

What most desk organization tips won’t say is that people usually start with hidden piles in boxes or drawers, then after 2 hours they find themselves having not accomplished anything.

So to avoid this, grab 2 boxes and put every single piece of paper on your desk into box #1. Use box #2 for other desk things like pens, office supplies, books, and whatever else you have on your desk.

Now pick up the top piece of paper from box #1 and use the F.A.S.T. Principle™ – File it, Act on it, Schedule it, Toss it.

Handle each piece of paper in less than 60 seconds. Get rid of any decor items that you no longer love or that clutter up your desk.

Action Tip: Play your favourite music and set a timer for 1-2 hours.

Try to imagine when you walk into your office the next day. How will it feel to have a clear desk?

Likely like you’ve lifted 100 pounds off your shoulders!

Now let’s continue this desk organization process by tackling the piles on the floor using the F.A.S.T. Principle™.

Remember our time constraint for pieces of paper. There’s no time for lengthy evaluating here. The object of the game is to get this done as fast as possible.

Getting organized is a clarifying, cleansing way of connecting to what’s really important to you. You should enjoy the process and reward yourself along the way for all of your hard work!

Tip 3: Create Zones in Your Office

Action Tip: Beware of the hidden costs of clutter. It costs your time, money, and space to take care of the things you don’t use. Now play your favourite music, set a timer, and get down to work for a couple hours!

Think of your work area as having different activity zones. Consider how you move things across your desk, what items you use most frequently, and what relationships certain materials have with different desk activities.

Command Central zones could be:

An In Tray for incoming mail
An Out Tray for outgoing mail
To-File Tray for papers to be filed
Project file zone
Reference file zone
Resources zone

Action Tip: While advancing through these desk organization tips, group like activities or functions together, then label them and their areas for quick, easy access.

Tip 4: Conquer the Email Traffic Jam

Mismanaged incoming emails can become a significant drain on productivity. The more emails pile up, the less useful it is to the user and company.

On the other hand, an empty Inbox is a delight to look at!

It reminds us we are fully caught up.

Did you know that the real purpose of an Inbox is to serve as a temporary resting location for information and requested actions BEFORE they are read by you?

Our Inboxes are not a catch-all for everything we’ve ever received, and they’re also certainly not a replacement for our information filing systems.

Apply the F.A.S.T. Principle™ here with each email.

Tip 5: Organizing is a Process, NOT a Destination

Action Tip: Only keep what you love and currently use on a regular basis!

Congratulate yourself for taking action on these desk organization tips this week and for clearing off your desk!

You’ve made some serious changes and that is definitely something to be celebrated.

Do keep in mind though, that organizing is a continual process of re-evaluating. You still need to evaluate what your goals are, what activities you currently enjoy, and what you don’t enjoy anymore, then edit accordingly.

Continually ask yourself these questions:

Does it work?
Do I like it?
Does it work for others?

Action Tip: Be willing to adjust your systems as your professional and personal lives evolve. Don’t worry about mistakes along the way, it’s just important to keep learning!

business systems