Is your life out of control?
Does your desk look like a toxic waste dump?
Are you overwhelmed with email, unreturned phone calls, and unfinished projects?
Are you looking forward to something better or just mired in muck?
Here are three simple things you can do today to take control of your life and start the new week with a better foundation. In less than an hour you can get your desk under control, get some long and short term goals set, and plan your week out for success.
The cost… less than $20.
Let’s get started…
1. Clean Off Your Desk: The first place to start is your command center. For most people with a work or home office, this is their desk. If yours is a mess and you can’t see the top, you need to take action today. While I’ve tried many solutions, the quickest and easiest is to create a recycle bin with a full course shredding strategy. I’ve put together a video that shows you how to set one up.
As you can see from the video, once you have your desktop cleaned off, it is much easier to start on new projects. One of the best is to set short and long term goals… Here’s how.
2. Goal Setting Toolkit: With that sparkling new desktop, take five minutes and download and print out our goal setting toolkit on Avery style business card stock. Once you have the cards printed, take some time to fill them out. Start with long term goals and work your way back. The instructions on the toolkit post will guide you along the way. Once you have your cards filled out, put the display cards where you can see them. Now you have something positive to work towards. To help you get the new week started right, you can take the next step and create a weekly planner.
3. Weekly Planner: Now that you can see your desk and have goals in place, you’ll need to get your upcoming week planned out. One of the easiest ways to do this is to download and printout our Top 6 daily planner. In the top boxes you can list out your top priority goals. If you are doing this on the weekend, plan your Monday out. Start with your highest priority items and fill the boxes as necessary. Once you are done with this, write down any phone calls, emails, and meetings that that you will need to handle to start your day. Once you have your high priority items listed, take a few minutes and write down some action steps you’ll need to take to get them accomplished.
As you start the new week, make sure to bring along your filled in daily planner and goal cards. Start with the highest priority and work your way down your action steps. Check off completed items as you go. As with any new system, you’ll need to make adjustments as you go along. Try some different approaches until you find a system that works for you. When you finish off your first day, take your completed planner sheet and three hole punch it. Put it in a small goal reference notebook for future reference. Then simply print out a new one for the next day and fill in unfinished items from your previous sheet.
I like to keep my daily planner along side my keyboard on a clipboard. I actually use mine as my mouse pad, which keeps it in view at all times. The clipboard keeps my daily sheet aligned and is also a great place for other sheets underneath such as phone lists and appointment sheets.
____________________________________________________________________
Shopping List: You’ll need the following items to complete the project.
Avery Business Card Stock (10 cards/sheet)
Plastic Bin large enough to hold most junk mail
Plastic In-box
Paper Filing Box
Letter Sized Clipboard
Small Notebook
All of these can be purchased at your local Office Supply Store. Since these are common items you may have most of these on hand.
Question: What tools do you use for office organization?