Tag Archives: furniture

Productivity

6 quick tips for managing paper

2 Comments

Close your eyes and picture the Zen-like state of your desk in a paperless world. When you need data from the last quarter, you speak to your computer and a soothing voice responds with the information. When it’s time to pay the bills, you instruct your computer where the payments are to come from.

Now, look at the paper sitting on your desk, dressers, tables, shelves, filing cabinets, etc.

The ideal of a paperless office has been around for at least three decades. While individuals, such as Eric Mack, experiment with paperless solutions, or online services offer paperless solutions, paper usage has increased significantly.

In 2003, Canadians used a whopping 2, 867,442 tonnes of paper, compared with 1,198,100 tonnes two decades earlier. Source: CBC News

For whatever reason, you’re stuck working with paper. Here are some tips for managing your piles (paper, that is).

  1. Keep only the work at hand visible. If you’re working on the month-end report, have it in front of you. Other pending work should be stored in some form of filing system, which makes it easy to retrieve, but keeps it out of sight.
  2. Have a fixed time each day to process routine paperwork. There are regular systems that dump a daily amount of paper on our desks: mail, filing, circulating files, etc. Set aside a few minutes every day to make sure this paper dealt with and not left piling up on your desk.
  3. Keep large wastebasket and/or shredder near your work area. Some percentage of the paper you process can go straight to recycling or garbage: used envelopes, advertising brochures, last week’s cafeteria menu. Toss it immediately.
  4. Don’t use a bulletin board. It’s a burial ground. I have a bulletin board in my office, but I am ruthless about what gets pinned to it. If you can’t be consistently ruthless, don’t put one on the wall.
  5. Organize your stationery. If you have to keep blank stationery on hand, get some type of storage system. Not only does lose stationery add to the cluttered look, it ends up dog-eared, frayed and unusable.
  6. Get a notebook. Resist the urge to take notes on dozens of pieces of scrap paper, notepads and sticky notes. Find a notebook that works for you and keep it with you at all times. That way, not only will you have a single, neat source of all your notes, you’ll only have one place you have to look to find information.

It doesn’t look like paper is going away anytime soon. You will need to have systems to control your paper flow.

Related articles
Enhanced by Zemanta
Productivity

Manage Your Paper With a RAFT

2 Comments

Ruthless paperwork is the route to a clean desk. It’s a problem of small-scale decision-making, every piece of paper requires a decision and a final destination. Too often, papers fall prey to the procrastination syndrome: I’ll think about it tomorrow.

Ideally, mail and paperwork should be attended to for a few minutes every day. If the amount is small, three times a week may do. You don’t want papers to build up to the point where you look at it and you get discouraged. The easiest way to avoid that is to keep up to date.

Files can be kept in open piles on a desk or in folders, according to your style. If a clean visual environment is important to you, use boxes and folders as you RAFT. If you prefer a look of activity and busyness, paper piles may be the answer.

If you do keep stuff, keep it in a way so that it doesn’t jam up your life and you can find it again.

Use the RAFT template: refer it, act on it, file it or toss it.

  • Refer it to the correct person, if you’re not the one to handle it.
  • Act on it immediately. Items that can be dealt with easily, do now; David Allen’s two-minute rule.
  • File it, if necessary. Eighty percent of filed papers are never looked at again. Make sure you really need it before you keep it.
  • Toss out anything you no longer need. Don’t keep routine memos or anything that gives you information you already know or have. Record meeting information on your calendar, then toss the memo. We you receive document revisions, toss the orginals.
Enhanced by Zemanta
Productivity

Document Management System

filing space
filing space (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Options for managing document filing and retrieval.

By establishing a consistent system for filing and tracking documents, you will impose a sense of order on your records. This will save you time and ensure that the records you need will be at your fingertips. This works for business or personal filing systems

There are lots of choices when it comes to filing documents. No single system suits all types of records. It is important to match the system you choose to the particular types of records (financial, personnel and so on) you are keeping.

Here is an overview of the most popular options:

  • Alphabetical filing is one of the oldest, most commonly used systems. It’s a good method for keeping personnel files, vendor records and customer files. Be sure to develop a universal index and a system of standards that describes how the names should be broken down for filing.
  • Numerical sequence, such as accounting numbers, customer numbers, order numbers. There are several types of numerical filing systems, with the simplest being consecutive. Documents are placed in order according to their assigned number. Experts say numerical systems work best if you have fewer than 10,000 files to manage.
  • Geographical sequence, such as by province: with breakdowns by cities, towns, postal codes, etc.
  • Subject or organizational, such as by department, function or subject activity.
  • Chronological, by years, quarters, months and/or days.
  • Color coded. This coding is generally used in conjunction with one of the above systems to make it even faster and more efficient. For a numerical filing system, for example, you’d use a different coloured file folder for each number from 0 to 9, to speed retrieval and refilling.
  • Hybrid. Companies often use alphabetical or numerical sequencing within geographical, subject or chronological filing systems.
  • Bar codes. Scannable bar codes can speed more than retail checkout lines and inventory tracking. Organizations ranging from doctors’ offices to Fortune 500 companies use them for document tracking. Various bar codes, including the alphanumeric Code 128, are commercially available. Users can invest in equipment and software to generate their own labels or buy labels commercially.
Enhanced by Zemanta
Productivity

6 quick tips for managing paper

Close your eyes and picture the Zen-like state of your desk in a paperless world. When you need data from the last quarter, you speak to your computer and a soothing voice responds with the information. When it’s time to pay the bills, you instruct your computer where the payments are to come from.

Now, look at the paper sitting on your desk, dressers, tables, shelves, filing cabinets, etc.

The ideal of a paperless office has been around for at least three decades. While individuals, such as Eric Mack, experiment with paperless solutions, or online services offer paperless solutions, paper usage has increased significantly.

In 2003, Canadians used a whopping 2, 867,442 tonnes of paper, compared with 1,198,100 tonnes two decades earlier. Source: CBC News

For whatever reason, you’re stuck working with paper. Here are some tips for managing your piles (paper, that is).

  1. Keep only the work at hand visible. If you’re working on the month-end report, have it in front of you. Other pending work should be stored in some form of filing system, which makes it easy to retrieve, but keeps it out of sight.
  2. Have a fixed time each day to process routine paperwork. There are regular systems that dump a daily amount of paper on our desks: mail, filing, circulating files, etc. Set aside a few minutes every day to make sure this paper dealt with and not left piling up on your desk.
  3. Keep large wastebasket and/or shredder near your work area. Some percentage of the paper you process can go straight to recycling or garbage: used envelopes, advertising brochures, last week’s cafeteria menu. Toss it immediately.
  4. Don’t use a bulletin board. It’s a burial ground. I have a bulletin board in my office, but I am ruthless about what gets pinned to it. If you can’t be consistently ruthless, don’t put one on the wall.
  5. Organize your stationery. If you have to keep blank stationery on hand, get some type of storage system. Not only does lose stationery add to the cluttered look, it ends up dog-eared, frayed and unusable.
  6. Get a notebook. Resist the urge to take notes on dozens of pieces of scrap paper, notepads and sticky notes. Find a notebook that works for you and keep it with you at all times. That way, not only will you have a single, neat source of all your notes, you’ll only have one place you have to look to find information.

It doesn’t look like paper is going away anytime soon. You will need to have systems to control your paper flow.