Got 5 minutes?  Then you can stay organized!

2. Give gift receipts with your gifts and toss the original receipts.

3. Reduce junk mail by registering with DMAChoice.org.

4. Throw away those small-dollar-amount cash receipts before you even get home.

5. Call the charities you no longer support and request to be removed from their mailing list.

6. Put your magazine subscriptions on a diet.

7. Scan your recipes and get rid of the sheets of paper and recipe cards.

8. Shred your medical explanation of benefit statements after you review them.

9. Throw away those investment prospectus reports if you’ve never read them then request online copies only.

10. Eliminate the other language portions of your product manuals.

While there are many ways to organize, I have found that my clients who feel disorganized handle their “stuff” in one of three ways.  These are names for the kinds of disorganization that I often encounter.

The Pilot

This person loves to “pile it” (that’s why I call them a pilot). In their home or office you will find things stacked vertically. It may be papers, books, or clothes; they may be stacked neatly or haphazardly but they are piles nonetheless. These pilots will often say that they know exactly where everything is and they’re right… it’s in a pile!  How are they comfortable organizing this way? Are they really comfortable organizing this way? The answer is yes.  In Lanna Nakone’ s book, Organizing for your Brain Type, she states that this type of person should embrace their stacking preference but limit the number of piles, save less stuff to begin with, and use clear containers.

The Flight Attendant

Visualize the flight attendant on a plane – you walk onto a plane, they have everything neat as a pin and are smiling brightly. But they have a secret place, a closet of sorts. There, all of the tools for their job are hidden away – the beverage cart, coffee carafes, garbage bins, magazines, coats, and who knows what else.  A person who organizes like a flight attendant has a neat and orderly appearance on the outside but don’t dare look in their closets, laundry room or desk drawers! In fact, many of us have been quasi flight attendants in our lives – company rings the doorbell and with one swoosh we clear the papers off the kitchen counter into a bag and throw it in the pantry. Many people become flight attendants in their attempts to organize because they never get around to actually organizing and use closets, boxes or any close-able area to stash things when they want a sense of [eace in their environment.

Crop Duster

This person has it all spread out.  Just like a little crop duster, making sure to cover every nook and cranny. Every horizontal surface is covered with dishes, papers, projects, etc.  When the crop duster person begins to think about getting organized, they are instantly overwhelmed because they do not know where to start. They are paralyzed and cannot take action. Barbara Hemphill, author of Taming the Paper Tiger at Home, says that clutter is postponed decisions.  This person just cannot make a decision about what to do with the “stuff”.

Let me give it to you straight-

If you haven’t read it by now, you are probably never going to read it. So let it go!

It’s time to start fresh and have a plan for all the reading you intend to do this year.

First, set some boundaries. How many articles, books, magazines will you let pile up to read before you actually get to reading them? Determine what is manageable. I have no more than 2 books in line to be read after I finish the book I’m currently reading. There are certainly lots more I want to read but I just keep a book list instead of buying more books and magazines to have stacked by my reading chair. (I am even moving to more ebooks now that I have my iPad.) Boundaries can also be set for the number of magazines you subscribe to. Take a look at the number of subscriptions you have now and if many of those have gone unread last year then cut back your subscriptions by 50% as a starting point.

Decide how you will contain your reading materials. Some ways to do this are with magazine holders, baskets, or dedicating a shelf on a bookcase or side table for things you plan to read next. Having a specific place that contains your reading materials is also another way to set a boundary. If the reading materials start to exceed the designated space, then some need to be purged. No guilt, just follow your own boundaries…

Avoid printing out articles or emails you find on the Internet; it’s a waste of our resources. Bookmark it and come back to it when you do have time to read it. For newsletters and random sheets of paper you have accumulated to read, create a portable ”To Read” folder.  Take it with you and sneak in some reading while waiting at the doctor’s office, while parked and waiting for kids to get out of school, while getting a pedicure or, my favorite, while sitting in the airport waiting for a flight.

If you really want to get some reading done, plan for it. Set aside time daily or weekly to read. If you are not doing this already, you may need to schedule actual time in your calendar until it becomes a habit. It’s perfectly fine to have an appointment with yourself, you know! Speaking of habits, it’s also a good idea to go through and purge your reading piles quarterly. Things that seemed like a “must read” look a whole lot different after 3 months has gone by! Re-evaluate and purge the reading materials regularly, you’ll feel so much better!

The benefits of Planner Pad:

• Monthly view
• 2 pages weekly view
• Different sizes calendars to choose from
• Space for roles, tasks, and appointments
• Room on the weekly pages to capture bits of information
• Designed to make all aspects of your life funnel into each week, in one place

Click here to See the Planner Pad video

Remember kindergarten? Specifically, do you remember the kindergarten routine? I had a chance to visit a kindergarten last year. My client at that time was a kindergarten teacher.  Not much has changed in the kindergarten classroom since my kids were in kindergarten. There’s still the reading/story time area, the activity tables, the colorful bulletin boards and the art area. What also hasn’t changed in kindergarten is the importance of routine. Every kindergartner knows what happens in their classroom when they first arrive, then what happens next and what comes after that – all the way to the end of  their day.

Just like kindergarten, we all have routines. Having a routine helps you get through your day smoothly. It’s predictable and heck, most times it’s downright comfortable.

Do you need to get a handle on your routines? Sometimes our routines need to be re-evaluated, adjusted and/or added to.

Re-evaluate

Is your routine working?  Is there room for improvement? Is the routine an old habit that no longer serves you? Is it time for a change? Our lives are not stagnant so sometimes the routine needs an adjustment. Take a moment and assess what part of your routine is working and what may be missing.

Adjust

The first adjustment that might need to be made is your outlook.  Do you have a good attitude towards this routine or do you do it begrudgingly? If your routine no longer serves you, be realistic- say good-bye and stop doing it. Often a routine simply needs to be tweaked or changed a little depending on the present day situation. Sometimes just shifting the time of do in which you do a routine will make it more effective or work better in your day. Make small adjustments at a time and give yourself time to get used to them.

Add

If you are happy with the routines you have, is there another routine you would like to establish? The best way to create a new routine is to pair it with an existing routine. Plot out the new routine and begin to establish it, but give it time. It takes time to get “in the groove” of a new routine and have it established.

“You have to have consistent effort to win the game, period.” -Chris Smith

Once you have a handle on your routines, don’t forget to periodically revisit these three steps –  reevaluate, adjust, and add – to keep your routines working optimally for you.

“One of the most glorious messes in the world is the mess created in the living room on Christmas day. Don’t clean it up too quickly.”  ~Andy Rooney

Time Saving Tips for Christmas Day

Make a breakfast casserole the night before and just pop it in the oven on Christmas morning

Set the table the night before

Use disposable baking pans and trays for meal prep

Put out a veggie and/or fruit tray for snacking throughout the day

Charge the camera batteries and set up the tripod the night before

Have a large garbage bag staged beside the tree the night before to hold discarded wrappings

Use a gift bag to hold all the bows and ribbons you plan to recycle as things are unwrapped

Have an empty clothes basket for each child to put their gifts into after they get unwrapped

Andy Rooney will be missed this Christmas, but he is right – Don’t clean up too quickly, savor your holiday with your loved ones and soak up the memories.

Today’s blog post is from a new friend of mine, Jennifer Gallagher.  She is very talented and is the owner of Virtual Assistance by Jen. If you are self employed or a busy executive, you can confidently delegate tasks to her company. Jen’s mission is to make a difference in the world, one client at a time.  Today, she gives us a few pointers on the “To-Do” lists we all have.

“To-Do” lists. Everyone has them. Some even have multiple lists! YIKES!!! But, do you ever notice those lists never seem to shrink? In fact, they seem to get larger by the day; at least in my case.  Well, I’ve come up with 15 items that may be on your list that can each be done in five minutes or less! READ MORE

I am speaking on the topic of being organized for successful networking this week.  I equate networking to going on a blind date.  Just like a blind date, there are lots of unknowns at each networking event – who will be there, will I be able to find clients or strategic partners, how will the event flow?  It can be pretty scary.

But like a blind date, you do have a few things you can control.

READ MORE

The “U” in FOCUS stands for:

Use a planning tool

Dwight Eisenhower said, ” Plans are nothing, planning is everything.”

In other words, it’s not about what you are going to do, it’s about what you have planned to do.  So set up some type of planning tool.  There are many varieties to choose from: white boards, wall calendars, paper planners, pdas and smart phones just to name a few.   Use what works for you.

Set aside time each week to plan your schedule, not just your time sensitive appointments but time allotted for your projects, your family and, most of all, time for yourself.  Make sure to leave margins in your schedule too. These are gaps of time that allow for things like travel time, meetings that run late, and last minute errands. Remember we have already discovered that you can opt out of a few things…. To be productive also think in terms of time blocking.  This means using chunks of time for similar tasks.  For example:

1. Run all your errands on the same day instead of going one or two different places each day.
2. Set up a specific amount of time to spend checking email and being on the internet.
3. Make all your phone calls in one chunk of time, instead of spreading them throughout the day.

If you need help finding a planner or learning how to do weekly planning, I’m here to help!