I call these processes ‘Quick and Dirty’ because these are basic survival strategies for people who feel overwhelmed and need something simple to help them get moving. So far we’ve looked at Email, Paper, and To-Do lists.

If you’re just joining us now – here’s the formula we’re applying to our high-stress, low-on-time organising projects this year:

The Quick and Dirty Organising Process:

1. Get real
2. Get some breathing space
3. Get past the guilt
4. Get new systems
5. Get a new mindset
6. Get support

Quick and Dirty De-cluttering

I haven’t yet met someone who truly loves the process of de-cluttering. What people do love is that wonderful lighter-than-air result of de-cluttering, so this motivates some people to do it. Let me show you how to approach your de-cluttering projects in a way that will leave you feeling great!

Step 1: Get Real

As my husband is fond of saying, “Nobody lives in the Pottery Barn catalogue.” He values neatness and organisation every bit as much as I do, but his point is that it’s OK if things aren’t perfect all the time.

When conquering clutter in your home, it’s important to go easy on yourself, especially if you have young kids, lots of commitments outside the home, and/or have moved house recently. Rarely is dealing with some clutter at home more important than relationships, work or volunteering, or settling into a new environment smoothly.

Quite often the solution is simply to choose the right area of the home to sort out because it will have such a positive impact on daily life.

Step 2: Get some breathing space

Instead of deciding what you are going to de-clutter, think first about the areas of your home which you are not going to tackle just yet. Think about areas that are behind closed doors or contain items you don’t use very often, and make a decision to leave that stuff as is for now. Make peace with the mess, for the time being.

Then pick the one area of your home that is really frustrating you the most on a daily basis. Is it your kitchen? The laundry/utility area? Under the bathroom sink? The entryway? Your master bedroom? The kids’ bedrooms? Their playroom? The guest room/study/throw-it-in-there-and-close-the-door room?

Pick your spot and commit to working here – and here only – until the job is done. Remember it could take several days or weeks, and that’s fine.

Step 3: Get past the guilt

Don’t worry about the imperfection of those other areas. You can’t do it all at once, and your success with the first area will motivate you to do another spot next.

Sorting through clutter can bring up some negative emotions for people: guilt, sadness, stress, and so on. Do everything you can to keep the process objective and neutral by following the advice below.

Step 4: Get new systems

When you start a de-cluttering project, it’s important to follow these steps:

1.  Keep it small. Look at the area you’ve decided to de-clutter, and mentally divide it into 4 sections. Do one section at a time.

2.  Sort first, store later. The first 75% of a de-cluttering job is sorting and making decisions about what you’re going to keep. This is hard work both mentally and physically, so people get tempted to skip part of it and go straight to putting some of the stuff away. This is called re-arranging, not de-cluttering.

3.  Stand up and use a timer while you sort. This keeps you moving.

4.  Keep it simple. Make 3 piles: Keep Here, Get Rid of It (donate/discard/recycle), and Belongs Elsewhere. You may also have a ‘Not Sure’ pile, but in my experience this ends up being the biggest pile for most people who use it…not super helpful in the end.

5.  Keep moving. Once you’ve made a decision that something needs to go or be moved, act on this; don’t let the new piles stagnate. At the end of each sorting session, remove anything that’s not in the Keep Here pile from the area.

6.  Shop last. Only buy new containers, shelving or furniture once you have absolute clarity about what items you need to store in the area. Take photos and measurements to the store. Otherwise you could end up shopping for more clutter.

Step 5: Get a new mindset

Very simply: If you do not use something regularly, and if you do not absolutely love something, then why do you have it in your life? This is the magic de-cluttering question.

You will have interesting answers to this question – like, “I might use it someday.” or, “Something might change.” or, “I’m saving it for my kids.” or, “I don’t know how/where to get rid of it.”

If your answers are on the wishy-washy side, then get tough, get rid of the stuff and create more room in your life for what you are doing now.

If your answers are solid enough to warrant keeping some stuff around, then get it framed, hang it up and enjoy it, or box it up neatly and label it. Then get it out of your way until the right time comes along to use it. Consider off-site storage if these items are crowding your living space. When you have to start paying to store things, your criteria for keeping them get a bit tougher!

Step 6: Get support

It’s always easier to de-clutter with more hands and brains on deck. Recruit help from your spouse, partner, kids, helper, parents, siblings, friends – or even us. Put on loud music, keep the mood lighthearted and fun, and have some great food/drink close by. Then dig in together!

If you want to jump-start your project with an expert and learn more about common de-cluttering pitfalls, effective decision-making, a foolproof sorting process and space-saving storage tricks, check out our course that’s all about de-cluttering: The Organised Home.

• Email us to book a private course for 4-5 friends or colleagues.
• Contact a program coordinator to discuss an in-house training program.
• Not in Hong Kong? Ask about virtual training options all around the world!

Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons.

This year we’re focusing on giving you quick processes to apply to various aspects of getting organised and productive. I call them ‘Quick and Dirty’ because these are basic survival strategies for people who feel buried and aren’t quite ready for all the  ‘best practices.’

So far we’ve looked at email and paper. This month our topic is To-Do lists.

To review – here’s the formula we’re applying to our high-stress, low-on-time organising projects this year:

The Quick and Dirty Organising Process:

1. Get real
2. Get some breathing space
3. Get past the guilt
4. Get new systems
5. Get a new mindset
6. Get support

Quick and Dirty To-D0 Lists

This is a great process that you can walk yourself through anytime you feel overwhelmed, and you will love it. I encourage you to do it as soon as you can!

Step 1: Get Real

You’ve heard this before, and here it is again: There is not enough time in your life for everything you want to do.

You must learn to be selective and let some things go – or let them wait until later.

Step 2: Get some breathing space

Take out several sheets of paper or open a blank Word document, and set a timer for 15 minutes. Get away from other people and the phone, put on some music you like, and relax into this exercise.

Now write down everything in your head and elsewhere (lists? sticky notes? white board?) that you want to do. Big or little, long or short term, personal or professional…get it all written down. Just keep writing until the timer rings. Give yourself room to pause and see what your mind presents to you.

Get past the guilt

You will now be looking at a huge list of obligations, unfulfilled intentions and exciting possibilities.

It doesn’t matter that some are overdue or that you never seem to make progress on others. What matters is that right now you are doing something to address the challenge.

Get new systems

1. Prioritise. Take out 3 highlighters (or highlight /sort electronically) and colour code your list according to these categories:

• Must be done before I go to sleep today
• Should be done this week
• Can wait until next week

For the (many) items that don’t fit the timeframes above, leave them un-highlighted. They are most likely planned projects or just ideas at this point.

2. Systemise. Set up 3 lists in whatever format you want to use: sheets of paper, ring notebook, electronic notes, etc.:

• To Do Today
• To Do This Week
• To Do Next Week
• Other

Write the appropriate tasks on these lists.  Put a red star beside the 3 items on the To Do Today list that matter most. This is where to focus your best energy.

3. Use your lists all day long. Develop the habit of capturing things on these lists and reviewing/reorganising them frequently.

4. Reset your lists weekly. On Friday, Saturday or Sunday, repeat as much of this exercise as you need to in order to feel ready for the week. Remember to look through the ‘Other’ list at this time and see if you want to activate anything on there.

Get a new mindset

Understand that it may be possible to do all these things, but probably not all at once – and not all perfectly. Life is about phases, and success always includes imperfections.

Get support

When you’re ready to take this to the next level, come learn how to finesse this system even further, streamline that ‘Other’ list and make more progress on your goals and projects in our course: Maximise Your Time.

Sound good? Here’s what to do:

• Check out when we’re running the course in Hong Kong next.
• Email us to book a private course for 4-5 friends or colleagues.
• Contact a program coordinator to discuss an in-house training program.
• Not in Hong Kong? Ask about virtual training options all around the world!

Is your inbox full of email you might need but haven’t had time to think about or file away? Is it all jumbled up with mail you definitely don’t need, but you don’t have the time or energy to sift the wheat from the chaff?

Just sweep it all in to an archive file labeled “2009” and forget about it.  If you need to go back and look for something later then Outlook’s search function can do a good enough job to find it for you.

Right now is the perfect time to do this : a few weeks in to a new year.  Anything from last year can’t really be “pending”, so you can just lump it all together.  Your inbox will be slim and trim, searching will run quicker on the most recent items and your backups will run much quicker.

The key word is “archive”.  Don’t just create a folder in the inbox, as that won’t really free up any space.  On the  Outlook File menu, select “Archive”.  Choose the “before” date as Dec 31 2009.  Browse to the location you want to keep the archive file and create a new one called “2009”, or something meaningful to you.  The process may take a while to run, so find a time when you won’t be needing the computer to do this!

Repeat for the sent items!

Do remember to keep a backup copy of the “pst” file you created, perhaps on a USB disk or burnt to a DVD.  There shouldn’t be any need to change any email from 2009 now, so a single copy safely stored elsewhere should be good enough.

Richard Carrey, Technology Support Ltd

Technology Support Ltd provides computer support for small businesses.  They can advise on the best ways to adminster your email and backup systems.  Check out www.tecsupp.com

As I said before, if getting organised is one of your resolutions, you need to be smart in your approach. If you bite off more than you can chew and/or dig in without a rational plan, you may well end up feeling worse than when you started.

So, to review – here’s the process we’re going to apply to our high-stress, low-on-time organising projects this year:

The Quick and Dirty Organising Process:

1. Get real
2. Get some breathing space
3. Get past the guilt
4. Get new systems
5. Get a new mindset
6. Get support

Quick and Dirty Paper Organising

More often than you might think, I come across an office that has paper piled up on every flat surface, including the floor. After reassuring the client that it’s not the end of the world, we do a few really tough things in that first session.

I have to say, “Trust me…” a lot. But then…the sense of relief and optimism we both feel at the end is pure magic. Ready to give it a whirl yourself?

Step 1: Get Real

I know you’d really like to go through every piece of that paper and get all those tasks done, apply all those great ideas, take advantage of all those discount offers, visit every travel destination, read each article, write every thank-you note…and on and on and on and on…

But the thing is, that would take for-e-ver, especially if you don’t know how to process that stuff properly.

Plus, a lot of it is old news or stuff you wish you had done. What good is spending time on that? Looking at it all now is more likely to make you kick yourself than propel you forward.

Look around you. There is probably one pile that represents your ‘hot’ papers, in other words, the ones that matter most – and soon. Those are the only ones to pay attention to right now. Put those on your chair.

Step 2: Get some breathing space

As for the rest of those piles? Get them out of your way. Grab some shopping bags or file boxes, and load them up with all those piles, starting with what’s on top of your desk and continuing out from there.

Label the bags or boxes as best you can (if at all), and move them as far from your workspace as you can. Another room is ideal. Then turn your back on it all and return to your desk. This is the dirty part, but trust me…

Get past the guilt

I KNOW there may be things in there you need. Fine. You can go after them later, when your office is functioning again. You’ll be much faster and better at getting through that backlog effectively once you have learned to work systematically.

If you tell yourself you have to start getting organised by sorting through the backlog, you will never get there. Focus on managing today’s papers – and tomorrow’s.

Get new systems

1. Create a single collection point for all incoming paper. Most people use a letter tray, but just an area of your desktop will do. Move your hot papers from the chair to this collection point.

2. Set up some lists and learn to pitch/recycle the paper, keeping only the idea, or task, website address, restaurant name, travel destination, or other bit of valuable information that is represented by each item. Write these things down on your lists, and look through them when you do your planning.

You can set up your lists in a small ring binder with tabs or use an electronic system like Evernote or Mind Manager. You can also use the Notes function of your handheld device and/or the Notes function of your electronic organising program (Outlook, Lotus Notes, Entourage, etc.)

3. Create some action folders that stand upright on or near your desk. These folders will help you clear your In-Tray quickly each time you sort through it. Common examples:

• Discuss (with boss/team/spouse at regular meetings)
• Bills to Pay or Receipts/Expense Claims
• Database/Address Book Updates (Put business cards in here)
• Reading (Great for regular newsletters, etc.)
• Watching/Waiting (For things you’ve delegated or pending events)
• Idea Capture (A personal favourite – for great ideas you want to process into your idea/project lists later, say once a month)
• Review on Weekend (This is for stuff you don’t need to think about until you’re planning for next week.)
• Current Projects (one file for each of your main projects)

4. Now sort through your in-tray items one by one, and process them onto your lists and into your action or project files. Do this at least once a week.

5. If you come across items you need to keep for longer term reference, you’ll need a hanging file box/drawer or some ring binders…but that’s a project (and article) for another day! For now, put them in a letter tray marked ‘filing.’

5. Establish a regular time each day or week to deal with what’s in your action folders. Tie this to a reliable routine you already have, or set a reminder on your desktop calendar or phone until this becomes a habit.

6. Make a personal commitment to clearing your work surface each day before you walk away from it. At worst, put what you’re working on in your in-tray. At best, put it where it belongs.

Get a new mindset

Dealing with piles of paper does set off a lot of emotional triggers for people, but remember this: If you believe it’s impossible to get organised, you’re right. If you believe you can get – and stay – sorted, you’re also right.

And do you know what? If you work at that backlog over the next few weeks, bag by bag in little bursts, you’ll get through it faster than you think – once you have the right systems in place. In the meantime, it won’t be in your way.

Get support

It’s no fun to do big paper organising project alone, so I’d recommend doing whatever you can to recruit some help:

• Do you have an assistant, partner, helper, colleague or child who could help with your sorting – or filing?
• Is there someone who can help you get through some of the administrative work in your paper action files on a regular basis?
• Could your friends, family members or coach help you stay positive and keep moving forward?
• Can someone cover for you at work or at home for a few hours here and there so you can get this project done?

Good luck – and send me your before/after pictures so I can celebrate with you!!