People tend to think that organised folks are hard-wired for productivity or know some magical, mystical secrets of keeping it all together.

We don't. We just work at it systematically, that's all.

There's something I do every week that I thought you might like to see. Be warned, though – it's ugly!

These photos show the amount of clutter my life produces in a typical 7-day period: the contents of the 5 bags I carried this week, plus the In-Tray on my desk:

Let's not forget about the email! I had 504 incoming messages last week.

Like yours, my life is fast and full of personal and professional activities. It's hard for me to stay totally on top of everything each day, especially when a lot of the hours are spent in meetings, with clients and being mom.

Coping With the Info-Flood

On a daily basis I try to:

• Keep on top of the most pressing incoming stuff (calls, fires and immediate follow-up from meetings)
• Keep my email Inbox running at empty (45-60 minutes total processing time each day)
• Accomplish one or two high-value items on my to-do list
• Connect well with my family

…After that, I'm usually pretty sleepy! There is still a lot of lower priority information or longer-term work left to be managed, so here's how I tackle that:

Each week I try to:

• Take a bit of time each weekend to dump everything out of all the bags I've carried and organise what was in there: ideas, short and long-term follow-up actions, items to be filed or put away, etc.
• Go through everything in my paper In-Tray and move it forward to the right 'bucket' in my workflow management system.
• Review a couple of email folders where I keep lower priority items, to see if I want to activate any of the tasks or ideas in there.

I use some simple and reliable processing strategies to make this happen quickly and completely. (If you'd like to learn more about these strategies, please get in touch).

The Result

By the time everything is sorted, safely captured, put away or scheduled, I've got a very clear picture of my personal and professional plans for the upcoming week(s). Then I can rest easily knowing nothing has slipped through the cracks.

No Time For This?

The Weekly Dump + Sort takes me a couple of hours every weekend, including about 30 minutes with my husband to go over the family/kid stuff plus sending a few emails to our team at Organising Solutions to focus and coordinate everybody's efforts for the week.

The weekend works for me, but it might not work for you. So when could you do this on a regular basis? Friday afternoon is a good time for many of our clients. Monday morning is too late if you want this approach to support your weekly planning…because the week has already begun!

Why Bother?

Give it a shot and experience the benefits for yourself – the peace of mind and clarity of priorities you get out of 60-90 minutes of weekly organising is SO worth the trouble, believe me.

This is some of my most productive and creative time all week because I find myself innovating as I go, coming up with ways to pull all the bits and bobs into cohesive ideas and then making these ideas part of my strategic plans.

I hope the same will happen for you as you make The Weekly Dump + Sort a routine.

Filed under: Routines