Organizing Office Spaces
Setting up an efficient office, you’ll use the same tools you use to get organized at home, only on a smaller scale.
Visualizing office space as a set of overlapping activity centers helps you locate tools for maximum efficiency. Assigning equipment to storage zones according to use keeps your space workable. Keeping clutter at bay and setting up clutter-containment areas prevents stuff from overwhelming a small workspace.
Making Your Office Work for You
When setting up an office, consider desk placement first. Are you more comfortable facing the door or pointed away from passing distractions? Locate your chair at a spot that energizes you, and then build your desk around you.
Where standard desks are one-sided, the most functional workspaces are L- or U-shape. If your desk is one-sided, add an attachment, or set a small table or filing cabinet at right angles to the desk and use it to expand your workspace.
Look high and low to find extra storage space in your work area. A computer hutch atop the desk keeps manuals, folders, and reference books close at hand. You can sometimes find extra storage beneath the desk as well; it’s possible to store software or supplies on the small shelf found in many desk kneehole spaces.
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An overload of framed photos and sentimental items can cramp small workspaces. Limit family photos or mementos to one or two special items, and hang them on the wall to free up valuable desk space. Keep extras in a box and rotate them to keep the display fresh.
Divide your desk area into storage zones according to how easy they are to reach. Shelves and drawers within arm’s reach should be kept free of all but essential items. Lower drawers and higher shelves, which can be reached with some effort, make a good place to store the stuff you need less often. Finally, storage space that requires you to move away from your desk, like an office closet, is the proper place to keep extra supplies and equipment you don’t use often.
Filing space at your desk is at a premium; reserve that real estate for current projects or for reference material that you consult frequently. Make a home for stale files or lesser-used general reference material away from the desk, or even outside the office, to keep your focus where it belongs.
If you use a paper planner, keep it open and turned to the current day on your desktop. Use it to track to-do items, to record sudden bright ideas, or to note a need to follow up.
Your computer is your most valuable office tool, so keep it running smoothly. Keep antivirus and security software current, and download antivirus updates promptly. To keep your computer working well, allow software applications to check automatically for program updates, and install them as needed.
Computer equipment is sensitive to dust and vibration; when possible, avoid storing a computer’s CPU unit on the floor where it will be jostled with every passing footstep. Don’t install a computer tower in a closed cabinet without ventilation, as heat causes extra wear on processors and circuit boards.
Even the most robust computer search feature can have a hard time finding specific computer files, if you’ve forgotten where you put them or what you named them. Set up folders in your documents area in categories similar to those you use for physical filing. Organize by project, by vendor, or by client, to keep relevant information together and easy to find.
Develop file naming conventions to organize your computer files, and use them consistently. Solutions such as 2012_01_Collins_Proposal, which specify year, month, and client in the file name, make it easy to sort and locate computer files.
Also develop the habit of replacing spaces in file names with the underscore character (_). Some mail clients, web browsers, and operating systems choke when they encounter empty spaces in file names; others fill them with substitute character strings that can make file names hard to read.