The Clutter Diet Blog

Before & After of Good Housekeeping Contest Winner, Part 2

Part TWO of our report on the makeover done for the grand prize winner of the Good Housekeeping contest we had last fall... see Part One here for an overview and before & after photos on the garage portion of the project.

Part Two... The Home Office.

The winner's office problems had accumulated over time, about five years. Dana and I had a lot of conversations about perfectionism and "All-or-Nothing Thinking," which happens when people think that if they can't do it exactly right, they just won't do it. So procrastination starts and then overwhelm kicks in. Anyone relate? :) Here are the before and after pics! (click photos for a larger version)

We set up a filing system for her that she was thrilled about, and we created a workstation on the far right shelves (off the photo) for her home business inventory that was feeling cluttered near her desk. We focused hard on the systems involved in daily and weekly processes, and since she felt really comfortable with the systems in place, she was comfortable with going through a few remaining boxes of paper on her own (you can see those on the lower shelves).

One of the "danger zones" for people prone to clutter is open shelving. Now that so much room is clear on the shelves, we don't want that to become an undesignated space where people put things down "for now." To prevent this, you can introduce more decorative pieces to the room that can hold the space. Dana is going to get a large flower arrangement in front of the window and put some more reference books and decorative items on the shelves by the desk.

What do you think? All told we worked on the garage and the home office for a total of 31 hours in TWO DAYS! Boy, were we tired. Organizing is definitely time-consuming, but it is extremely rewarding too. And all the more fun when you get a $1000 shopping spree from the Container Store. Thanks again, Container Store Friends, for contributing to the GH contest! We used a lot of our "little stuff" in here, like the clear acrylic trays on the desk, some drawer dividers and hooks, and some bins that took away the "elsewhere" items to their new homes.

More tips and insights from Dana's projects in the weeks and months to come. I hope you've enjoyed seeing our work-- please comment if you are so moved!

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5 Ways Getting Organized Can Help You Get a Job

Unemployment is high, and if you're competing for jobs out there, being organized can give you an edge. Here's how:

• Your contacts:  Having a good contact management system, whether it's an old-fashioned address book or a searchable system on your computer, means you can find phone numbers and addresses more quickly. The job search process is all about networking and follow-up, so if you can't find that address to send a thank-you note or return someone's call, that's not good! Perusing a well-organized contact list also might remind you of more people you know who could help. (Great tips on networking and follow-up here in this previous post, "Organize Your Way to Better Relationships," from my friends who are the experts.)
• Your bills:  When money is tight, it's all the more important to keep a closer watch on the bills to make sure they get paid on time. It may be more important than you think-- some employers now check your credit rating before hiring you! (See this MSN Money article "How bad credit can cost you a job") Have one place to put the bills when they come in and commit to reviewing and paying them once a week if possible. (More tips here in this previous post: "Top Ten Tips for Paying Your Bills Efficiently.")
• Your files:  Organizing your files can help you put your resume together by reminding you of accomplishments and dates of previous employment. Going through this process may also help you find your passport or other identification needed for the first day on the job when you land one.
• Your calendar & task list:  An organized calendar used consistently means you will be more likely on time for interviews and informational meetings. Having your calendar synchronized on the web is a great idea in case you need to check your calendar elsewhere unexpectedly. Try Google's easy calendar sync application that works with Microsoft Outlook. Your task list and calendar will also help you make those follow up calls and get those meetings by keeping you on track. Make sure you document your conversations and make note of any actions that are required of you.
• Your first impressions:  Walking into a meeting with a polished appearance shows that you are serious, responsible, and professional. Does your briefcase or purse give the right impression? Do you have an organized manner in which to take notes, produce a business card, and store a business card that you've been given? A simple legal pad folio with a business card holder is very helpful to provide these functions during an interview.

Of course, if we are talking about jobs, I wouldn't be doing MY job if I didn't mention that donating what you don't need to Goodwill helps OTHER people find work! One working computer provides over 5 hours of career counseling for someone facing challenges to finding employment. You can use the donation impact calculator at http://donate.goodwill.org to see what your donations of clothing and household items can actually do for the community. And if you need help finding work, Goodwill is there for you, too. Every 45 seconds of each workday, someone earns a job with Goodwill’s help — and you can be next! Here are some great job search tips from Goodwill's website.

Are you looking for a job? What organized systems are helping you in the search? Share in the comments!

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7 Useful Folder Categories You Might Not Be Using

Filing is typically a fairly personal thing, varying because of how people's brains work differently and the fact that people have unique experiences and memories and triggers. There are some standard file folder label names that almost everybody has in their file drawers, like "Bank Statements" or "Medical Insurance," but here are a few practical ones that you might not have considered:

• Travel: Places to Go. Here's a file to hold all of those brochures you've picked up and articles you've clipped about dream vacation spots. Grab this when you are planning some time off, and when you go through it, make sure you weed out what's no longer relevant.
• Travel: Places We've Been. Sometimes it's useful to keep some brochures and maps and other information from vacation places that you might see yourself returning to someday. If you have a lot of these, sometimes people break them down into individual folders for different places, but that is not typically needed.
• Travel: Local Things to Do. Here in Austin we get Austin Monthly magazine, and they always have great restaurant reviews and articles with names like "101 Great Things to Do in the Summer." This file is a great place to keep ideas like this for when you have a long weekend or have visitors coming to town. You can also make a "Tourist Binder" as I have outlined on this previous post. You can also call it something else if you like... none of this is set in stone!
• Career Planning. This folder provides a home for aptitude testing information, various historical versions of your resume, performance reviews, and educational transcripts.
• Credit Reports. Through the weekly "menu" plans of projects we provide in our online program, we remind our members to run these reports three times a year. Smart monitoring of your credit report keeps the chance of identity theft lower by helping you catch mistakes and fix them before they are too far gone. The only credit reporting website that is official and authorized, by the way, is www.annualcreditreport.com. Be very careful about visiting others who may be only trying to upsell you on further monitoring services (or worse!). 
• Humor. Also known as the "Funny File." Where else do you have a home for those little torn out comic strips and article clippings after they have worn out their welcome on your bulletin board? If you still think they're funny and want to keep them, here's a place.
• Trophies. Call it Keepsakes if you like, but the difference here is that these are things that represent accomplishments you are especially proud of. A photocopy of the first check you received in your business... a particularly meaningful thank you note from a customer or teacher... a clipping of yourself from the newspaper... These are things that make you feel great when you look at them. I also keep things like this posted off to the side of my vision board (my big corkboard wall I put in my closet-- read about that here). And of course, if you have a bunch of these, you can make a scrapbook with them instead.

It's worth noting that all of these folder names I also have as ELECTRONIC folders too, or I use variations of them as tags in Evernote to hold little bits of information. Some people may even have these only as electronic folders and not have any paper!

What are your favorite, clever files you've created that help you? Share in the comments!

And, hey, get ready for a BIG announcement on Monday, everybody!  I can't wait....see you then!

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Shred or Be Sorry: A Cautionary Tale

My sons are working this summer for our city's public works department, and they were helping with an "illegal dumping" incident this week that reminded me of how people need to be careful with their personal information!

Apparently a tanning salon has gone out of business, and they dumped a huge bunch of papers and trash next to our city dumpster. As my son was cleaning up, he realized that the papers had customer information all over them, including contact information, social security numbers and even some credit card numbers! And my son and his team just had to take it to the dump "as is." It was not their job or responsibility to make sure that information was destroyed properly-- it was the tanning salon's job and they failed utterly.

I was upset for all of the people whose information was potentially compromised and angry at the irresponsibility of this business owner. It's a great opportunity to remind all of you who read the blog to be more mindful of identity theft as you organize your lives. Here are a few strategies to follow:

• As you open accounts, don't willingly provide companies with any more information than is necessary to process your transactions. It's rare that you actually must give your Social Security number to anyone, and a tanning salon certainly is an example of a business who does not need that information to provide you service. It's okay to ask questions about providing extraneous data and get the manager involved if necessary. You can be nice about it, and know that you will not be the first person who has asked.
• When in doubt, shred-- that is a great rule of thumb when you've already decided to throw your papers in the trash. In my example above, the business is the one who should have been shredding, but as you can see, whatever is thrown in the trash may be read by somebody else. Shred anything you throw away at home that might compromise your identity, your privacy, your finances, or your reputation.  :) 
• Buy a shredder, and don't scrimp on quality. To me, a shredder is as necessary a home appliance as a toaster or refrigerator. Buy the best cross-cut (confetti) model you can afford and know that a cheap one will aggravate you to no end and will break quickly. Since people do ask me, I like the Fellowes brand, and the one I have has never jammed (it's an Intellishred PS-79Ci). The cost of this shredder is less than the combined cost of the two cheaper ones I burned up and cursed over before getting this one. Note that two pieces of paper folded into thirds and inserted into an envelope add up to 8 thicknesses of paper, so if you want to be able to shred things without opening the envelopes, you'll need at least an 8-page capacity shredder. I prefer much higher.
• Don't forget computer data too! Most new, high-quality shredders have features that allow you to grind up CDs and DVDs. Old floppies can be easily taken apart and destroyed too. eHow has a good article on this subject. Hard drives can be trickier, but you can try Eraser and Blancco. (Use any of these methods at your own risk and get advice from an IT pro beyond me if you have questions.)
• If you have a large batch to shred (like this lazy business owner did), hire a shredding truck to come on-site to do it all at once. It is not very expensive, especially considering how long it would take you to sit there and shred it yourself with a puny overheated machine. Read my previous post with a step-by-step account of how my client lost 783 pounds in one day.  :)
• Protect your passwords and other account information by organizing it well. For electronic storage of information, I love SplashID, which is a product I have followed along with since I had a Palm Treo way back when. Now I have their very impressive Android version, and it's compatible with Blackberry and iPhone and almost everything else too.  I have it synchronizing between my smartphone and my desktop. For a more traditional password organizing system, you can use a plain old A-Z index card file and create a card for each account. You can also use the Internet Password Organizer® book we sell in our online store, which is a nondescript black, spiral-bound book that neatly alphabetizes and organizes your information. (This is a great gift, by the way!)

Be careful out there! And wear sunscreen too!  :)

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A Checklist for Your Checklists

I just read The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right by Atul Gawande, mainly because one of my favorite writers, Malcolm Gladwell, so heartily endorsed it. (book photo from author's site)

You may know how I am always going on about capturing information... a checklist is one great way to capture important information and make it able to be replicated by others. I love using checklists for office procedures, for example, and recipes are actually checklists too. Everyone knows how to make simple packing lists and the like, but here are some things from this book that I never thought about with regard to writing good checklists-- a checklist for checklists, if you will:

• What is the "pause point" at which the checklist is supposed to be used? This pause point should be specified.
• Do you want a "Do-Confirm" checklist, or a "Read-Do" checklist? A Do-Confirm is used when people perform the job separately and use the checklist afterward to confirm that the job was done correctly. A Read-Do checklist is used when people are to check off the tasks as they are completed.
• Is your checklist too lengthy? A rule of thumb is between 5-9 items on only one page.
• Have you focused on the steps that are the most crucial and left out anything that would be distracting?
• Is your wording simple and exact, using familiar language to the end-user?

This book's author, Atul Gawande, was compelled to write this book based on his experiences trying to write and implement checklists for hospital staff and surgeons. He knew there were over 100,000 deaths due to surgery complications each year, and that many of those deaths could be avoided. He worked with the World Health Organization and key hospitals to create checklists for reducing infections and standardizing surgery precautions.

Using a simple 2-minute checklist in ICUs in Michigan, a Johns Hopkins researcher reduced infections by 2/3 in the state and saved 1500 lives in the first year.

For surgery, the checklist cut deaths by over 1/3 in the first 8 hospitals that adopted it.

The surgeons were often reluctant and even offended to be asked to use the checklist, but after using it for 3 months, 80% of them liked using it and saw it catch errors. The most telling question, "If you were having surgery, would you want the checklist used?" had 93% of the doctors saying YES.

Checklists are simple solutions that solve so many problems-- and in this case save lives. Click here to watch Atul Gawande interviewed on The Daily Show talking about the book.

Quote from the book:

"Faulty memory and distraction are a particular danger in what engineers call all-or-none processes: whether running to the store to buy ingredients for a cake, preparing an airplane for takeoff, or evaluating a sick person in the hospital, if you miss just one key thing, you might as well not have made the effort at all."

How have checklists positively affected your life? Share in the comments!

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Top Ten Tips for Paying Your Bills Efficiently

It's National Pay Your Bills Week (3rd week in February). I think this means we get to eat cupcakes while we are writing checks this week.  :)

Given the current economic climate, this subject is more important than ever! You really want to get this process down to avoid late fees and other unnecessary expenses related to disorganization. Here are my top ten tips, edited down from our article on Managing Your Personal Finances, available in our member area for our Clutter Diet® online organizing program.(We have hundreds of searchable articles in our member area, along with hours of multimedia tutorials and audio content!)

• Have a designated home for bill-paying supplies like checks, deposit slips, letter openers, pens, payment coupon booklets, postage stamps, envelopes, return address labels, a calculator, and a stapler.
• Decide on certain days to pay the bills, then stick to your plan consistently. You might choose the 1st & 15th, 10th & 25th, every week, or every other week on a certain day. I pay my bills every Tuesday, and it gives me great peace of mind. (Members can use our Clutter Diet customized e-mail reminder system to help them remember.)
• Keep all bills together in one place as they arrive. You can use a tray or vertical sorter to keep them visible and ready, or even a clothespin.
• Automate as much as possible, directly with your vendors. You can set up payments with most vendors to pay automatically either by credit card or automatic draft.
• Don't hand-write checks and mail them out if you don't have to! Use your bank's online billpay features for vendors who don't have automated payment options (or if you just prefer having more control). You can set up recurring payments that you never have to worry about again, like the mortgage payment, the orthodontist, or anything.
• Simplify your number of bills by consolidating down to only 1-2 major credit cards instead of multiple department store and gasoline cards.
• Pre-inked rubber stamps are fantastic. Get one made for endorsing checks for deposit with your name, "For Deposit Only" and your bank information on it. Also get a PAID stamp with rotating date wheels so you can breeze through notations on your bills quickly.
• Our favorite way to file paid household bills and bank statements is by month. You can buy a brown accordion file in the office supply store marked January-December. Just put everything for each month in there, tie it up with a big bow at the end of the year and start over. You can keep these in archived storage for the 7-year period that is normally recommended (check with your accountant or attorney for retention advice specific to your situation).
• Go paperless. Most major institutions would now prefer to send paperless bills, and it means less paper clutter for you to handle and file. Look on the envelope flap of your bill’s return envelope or in the text of the bill itself to find out how your statements can be electronically received. (Make sure you have a good backup system on your hard drive!)
• Get complete freedom from all bills. If you travel often, or if you are paying bills for an elderly relative, or if you just don't like dealing with bills at all, you might like Paytrust.com. They are now owned by Intuit, and have been around for at least ten years. We started using Paytrust when we went on a sabbatical in 2000. They assist you in changing all of your bills' addresses to their clearinghouse, where they receive them and scan all the bills in color. They notify you via e-mail that the bill has arrived and tell you what is going to happen next. You set up payment rules for each payee to automatically pay when the bill is received. You can set up rules like, "Pay this bill automatically within (x) days of receipt, as long as it's under (x) dollars." You can also use multiple bank accounts. Paytrust charges $12.95 per month.

So go eat those cupcakes and get those bills paid this week! Let me know how you're doing and share your favorite bill-paying tips in the comments.

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Oh, Goody! It's National Clean Out Your Files Month!

October is National Clean Out Your Files Month. I know, I know... it's so wonderful, but PLEASE, contain yourself!

I typically recommend two times of the year to clean out your files. You can either do it now during its "appropriate" month, or you can do it in April right after you have done your income tax return. I prefer April, and I do it once a year only. April feels really good because you know you can safely archive things from the immediately previous calendar year. If you want to do it twice a year, you can do your major archiving of financial paperwork in April and go through the content of files on other topics in October. These two recommended times are six months apart, so that works out well.

Here are some of my favorite file management tips to motivate you and inspire you, should you decide that this celebration merits some appropriate filing festivities:

• Invest in good quality filing cabinets and supplies. This does NOT mean spending a lot of money. If your city has a used office furniture liquidator, you can get killer deals on scratch-and-dent filing cabinets there (along with shelving, desks, and even sticky notes and markers sometimes!). You can also check thrift stores. Test the drawers before buying to make sure they work smoothly. I believe in using hanging file folders, and I do pay a little extra for the better quality ones so that the metal pieces don't come unglued and fall out easily.
• Don't stuff your file drawers too full. How many of you are avoiding filing because you can't stand plunging your hand into the tight drawer, getting paper cuts, and fighting to get the papers into the folders? Adjust your drawer space so that you can easily get the folders in and out and leave some room to grow, too. If you are running out of space, guess what? It's National Clean Out Your Files Month! Go for it! You can also archive older files to another location to free up some space.
• You have my permission to NOT use manila interior folders inside the hanging folders...unless you want to! But if you're just filing reference material that may not be accessed for a long time, you really don't need to use an interior folder. Use the manila folders if you'll be accessing the information frequently or taking it with you away from the office.
• Box-bottom folders can be just the right solution if you have some thick files. I like the 2-inch capacity size. These are specialty hanging folders that have a creased edge on the bottom to expand and hold a big chunky pile of paper. That is, if you must keep it that way.
• Always ask yourself, "Can I get this electronically instead?" If the answer is yes, and you have a great backup system, please shred and/or recycle that file!

So break out the champagne, or at least order a pizza, and get those files in order. What's your approach to your filing system? Do you have files, piles, stacks, or boxes? Share in the comments!

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My Client Lost 783 Pounds in One Day!

How would you like to lose 783 pounds in one day? My client just did. Do you have multiple boxes of many years' worth of papers in your garage or basement that really should be shredded and discarded, but you have no idea how to approach the project? You probably don't want to sit there with a household-grade shredder for hours going BZZZT, BZZZT, BZZZT. No, you don't.

Here's the answer: Hire a mobile shredding truck to come to your house and get it all done in about 30 minutes or less. Here's my little tour of the process, and I'll give you some tips at the end on how to make sure you choose the right company. All of these photos can be clicked to view in a larger size.

First, let me just say that when I witness the destruction of these papers I do it with the relish of a little boy seeing a big red fire truck. I think this is terribly interesting and cool! The truck arrives and the shredder technicians start loading the paper into these bins. We had about 20 file boxes of paper, which weighed in at 783 pounds when we were all done. Each full bin is about 300 pounds, and we had 2.5 of them.

 

As they are filled, they roll the bins to the truck and send them up the chute to be dumped into the shredder. It all happens inside the truck, and there are cameras inside so you can watch what is happening.

 

 

The truck's console has a monitor where you witness the destruction. Here are pictures of the console and views of the blades and the papers getting chewed up. If you are old enough to remember Dudley Do-Right, the evil villain Snidely Whiplash used to use dastardly blades like these-- I always think of that when I see them spinning menacingly in there. :)

  

 

 

You can even see a view of the back of the truck from another camera and see your actual pile-o'-shreds back there.

When investigating options for shredding companies, here are some questions to consider:

• Does the company seem legitimate with sound business practices?
• Ask for specifics on what they will be able to take (3-ring binders, hanging folders, binder clips, CDs, floppies).
• Will they take it off-site, or shred on-site? (Mobile shredding trucks are most secure because you can witness the destruction)
• What are their payment terms (invoicing, check or credit card)?
• How do they charge– by weight?  By box? For mobile shredding trucks, cost is usually a minimum per trip charge plus an amount per pound. (This project was about $230.)
• Do they provide a Certificate of Destruction immediately?
• Are their employees carefully screened?  Do they do background checks and drug tests?

When you've decided on a strategy, here are some tips for coordinating the project:

• Make general notes about what is being shredded as you gather the materials. Type up, print, and file afterward with the Certificate of Destruction.
• Centralize all of the items to be destroyed. Make sure it's very obvious what is supposed to be shredded and what is not.
• Witness that the documents are secured or destroyed, and make sure you get the Certificate of Destruction.

If this project is too big for your needs, look for other options for shredding smaller quantities--you may be able to take a few boxes yourself to the shredding company offices, and you may find that there is a community "shred day" where you can take your papers (usually for one free box).

Whatever you do, PLEASE SHRED. Identity theft is a huge problem and getting worse. Do you have any fun stories of losing that many Clutter-Pounds(SM) in one day? Share in the comments! Many thanks to my trusty vendor, Marshall Shredding, serving Austin & San Antonio. You guys are always terrific to work with!

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Information Gluttony- Revisited

This past week I have been swept up in the time/space vortex that is the annual NAPO conference, this year in Orlando, FL. (National Association of Professional Organizers) Yes, there were about 800 of us crazy organizer people in one place, can you imagine? I will be sharing what I learned and favorite new organizing products from the expo in our newsletter this week. You can click here to sign up for our newsletter at no cost. It goes out every Thursday. And now for something completely different...

One of the most popular topics I discuss and have posted about is "Information Gluttony." Our Clutter Diet members and experts were recently chatting in our message boards about this as it relates to people-pleasing, and I thought this was an excellent point to expand upon.

Sometimes I have seen clients keep lots of magazine clippings, newsletters, and other types of information for the purpose of sharing it with others. Are you trying to be a Know-It-All with all of the information you're collecting?

Being a Know-It-All is another way of trying to be a "pleaser." (See our related post on "Overdoers Anonymous") You may want to play the role of always having the answers and being the Go-To-Guy or Gal. Is this role really serving you? Is it the best use of your time? Are there better ways you could help the people in your life?

Is this really something the people in your life want? Are you sending this stuff to them to try to reinforce a point or prove an argument you were having? (Example: "See, you should be eating less salt because of your high blood pressure. This article says so!") If so, this may be annoying and unwelcome.

Most of the time when I work with clients like this, they have never gotten around to sending out all of this helpful information to people anyway, so it's certainly not helpful if it's sitting there unsent. And often the information is outdated by the time they re-encounter it.

I highly encourage all of you who are saving these items in paper form to "go electronic" and at least try to send the info to others via e-mail with links they can pursue on their own. Less clutter for both of you.

Can you relate to being a "pleaser" with information? Share your thoughts in the comments.

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National Organize Your Files Week- Yippee!

The third full week in April (next week, 4/19/09-4/25/09) is National Organize Your Files Week-- aren't you excited? How will you celebrate?

What do you mean, you're not celebrating?

Let's just get this out of the way-- Nobody really gets excited about paper. Even those of us who teach about managing paper and help others file things for a living really don't love it either. We just don't mind when it's someone else's paper. Our own papers are much less fun.

Why is that? Objectivity! If it's someone else's paperwork, you have no emotional attachments or guilt related to the decisions in the piles. You can breeze through them faster.

We talk about how all clutter ultimately is delayed decisions and actions. Paper is a very concentrated dose of this-- each pile of stacked thin sheets is compactly and efficiently holding potentially hundreds of delayed decisions and actions in a small 8.5 x 11" space.

When going through your own paperwork and mail, try to step back from it mentally and concentrate on these three questions to help you get through the piles faster:

1.  What is this? What does this paper want from me? I have had years of practice refining this skill... scanning the paper to quickly figure out the bottom line. You can learn this too! Look for the first question or sentence in the letter; anything that is bolded, underlined, highlighted, large, or red; and the last sentences in the letter. Look for catch words and phrases like "Pay by," "Due Date," "Return by," "Statement Enclosed," or any actual dates on the page. 

2.  Does this paper fall into the category of Action, Reference, or Trash? (Just remember A.R.T.) Once you've figured out what the paper is and what it wants from you, you can decide if you want to take action on it, keep it in your files, or shred/recycle it. If it requires action, keep it separated from the papers that you're simply keeping for reference. This is half the battle, my friends. Don't mix the two together.

3.  If this person or company knocked on my door or called me on the phone, would I spend time talking with them? For all of the catalogs and junk mail sales pitches directed your way, pretend that you are a super-busy executive who has time for only the things that matter most. Try to quickly bottom-line what they're selling and whether you are remotely interested, and don't fall for the trap of essentially "going out shopping" in the middle of the day by leisurely browsing through catalogs. Save the catalogs for a time when you really want to shop and put them together in a reading basket. Don't let them distract you from sorting all the way through the pile.

See if these questions will help you make the piles disappear more quickly! It leaves you more time to celebrate occasions like National Organize Your Files Week, which I plan to celebrate like author Katherine Mansfield, who said, "Tidied all my papers. Tore up and ruthlessly destroyed much. This is always a great satisfaction." Next post: dealing with the actual files already in your cabinet. Share your favorite paper tips in the comments!

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