Officekeeping: Cleaning from the inside –> out

Spring has (almost) sprung! It’s time for some small business spring cleaning and organizing! It’s always a good idea, even for the most disorganized of business owners, to do some heavy- duty office cleaning and organizing at few times a year. You’ll not only be more organized, but feel better. Working from a well-organized and newly cleaned office is like being gifted a whole new work area!

Don’t worry, it doesn’t have to be a huge one-day undertaking if you don’t want it to be. Actually if you have a lot of catching up to do, I recommend dividing your office into zones and committing yourself to a zone per day for one week. That way, you can do a quality job on each task.

We’ll start from the inside and work our way out.

Here are the zones:

Zone 1: Insides
Insides include drawers, files, closets, boxes, and anything else you might have hidden away. Time to pull out your files and refile/rename folders (i.e. some files can now be moved to a collective “2007” file) or destroy documents you no longer need. Go through drawer junk and only save what you absolutely need. You might be amazed at how many things you can throw away and how many pens you never knew you had!

Zone 2: Surfaces
Surfaces include desktops, shelves, and any other surface you can think of . Reorganize books, go through papers and file or throw away. Find a permanent home for homeless objects.

Zone 3: Electronics
Electronic items could include computers, PDAs, phones, printers, scanners, faxes. Take some time to organize your computer files, update software/anti-virus, organize your email, and backup your files. Make sure printers, scanners, and faxes are in working order, clean, and have sufficient ink in the cartridges.

Zone 4: Floors
Clear anything off the floor that does not belong. Find homes for things and papers that should not be on the floor.

Zone 5: Scrub-a-dub-dub Everything
Now that you’ve organized the innards, surfaces, electronics, and floor of your office…it’s time to dust away the winter grime, disinfect the winter germs goodbye, vacuum, and mop away the winter blues. Welcome to spring!