Time to Get Organized

Funny that this post filed under Productivity should follow my post on watching cheese age, but maybe that's just the kind of day it is.

Walking in to my office this morning, I realized the world needed to stop and I needed to get organized. Just coming off of several big project launches, two conferences and several project deadlines wrapping up, David Allen's book on Getting Things Done and Mark Hurst's book on Bit Literacy, Productivity in the Age of Information and E-Mail Overload stopped me in my tracks.

Observing and having several conversations this week with information workers in overload-mode, I realize not only do I sympathize, but I am falling victim to my own hell of piles of files, inbox disorder, sticky note mayhem, and a perhaps one-too-many open tasks on my to-do lists nagging at me to cross off or update.

Needing a little levity to tackling this mess, I started organizing a lot of the cool things I brought back to the office from our GEL 2007 conference.  Finally, being able to enjoy a rich and delicious cup of MarieBelle's Aztec Hot Chocolate Avery brought back from his Cocoa Tour on Day 1 of GEL, looking at this mess of a desk made the start a little easier.

Starting my sort, I happily uncovered my Schlep luggage tags I bought from Flight 001 and researched the product line from Bob's Your Uncle. It was serendipity. Going online I actually found even more inspiration and some cool tools I am looking forward to using and being more organized with flare. Thanks to greengrassdesign and Uncommon Goods, I am ready to go to file, schlep, store and plan my way through a clean desk to enjoy the weekend.

Getting organized takes discipline, but it doesn't have to be laborous or perfect even. Find some tools that work for you and make you feel good about clearing the space for new ideas, creativity and the opportunity for innovation.

PS -- Yeah, this blog comes at a time when my desk still looks like this, but inspiration called and I went with it...

Comments

[Marilyn]

Your post made me realize that I would like to find some sticky notes labeled "WTF?" I have a whole pile of stuff dedicated to that theme!