50 Ways to Get Better Organised
(5 votes)
Much of the stress in life comes from feeling that you don’t have things under control. But it doesn’t take much, says Lisa Freedman, to improve the way you operate at home and at work.
WORK
• Buy a laptop - it means that your office moves with you. Get one with a built-in fax modem; then all you’ll need to work as and when you feel like it is a telephone and a telephone line.
• Try and work first on the things you would rather avoid, leaving until later those that you enjoy. Easier said than done, but effective nonetheless.
• Set yourself time zones each day during which you carry out specific tasks, and try and tie these in with fluctuations in your energy level. Most people are freshest in the morning and dip after lunch; so tackle more creative tasks in the morning, and save the early afternoon for filing and phoning.
• Make sure that where you work is comfortable. You should have enough light and space, a back-supporting chair and the minimum of noisy distractions.
• Open your post immediately and throw away anything you don’t need. Try and look at each bit of paper only onc.
• Clear your desk of clutter nightly; file your papers daily.
• Have a clock prominently displayed on your desk - it will stop you wasting time.
• Before you leave work each night make a list of things that you need to do the next day and stick it on your screen or desktop. It will help you to be up and running first thing in the morning.
• Buy an electronic organiser to serve as your diary, address book and calculator. Download information from it daily onto your computer so that you always have a backup.
• Develop a good, clear filing system. There is nothing more stressful than not being able to find essential items as and when you need them.
MONEY
• Shop on-line, for weekly groceries, among other items. You’ll save money as well as time.
• Pay bills - utilities, credit card, etc - by direct debit. You won’t pay interest charges if you don’t miss payment dates, plus many utility companies offer a discount for this method of payment.
• Bulk buy… everything.
• Book in advance or at the very last minute - either way is cheaper, but the former is less stressful.
• Start a pension as soon as you can. The longer you save the less you pay.
• Put some money in the stock market - building societies pay such poor rates.
• Take out store credit cards whenever you can. They have great offers and give extra time to pay, but remember to pay them off each month or you’ll be paying exorbitant interest.
• Take out an ISA. If the Chancellor is going to give you a tax-free saving, use it.
• Shop in the sales or at designer outlets. Never pay full price.
• Buy a house as near to work as possible. Nothing reduces stress more than being able to walk to work.
HOME
• Keep a file or alphabetical notebook with all the workmen, tradespeople and repair services which you need to run your house. Use the same notebook to keep a record of the serial number and model number of any item that you might need when reporting a fault.
• Keep a notebook on the fridge or the kitchen noticeboard, on which to write anything you have run out of. Encourage other members of the household to use it.
• Clean one cupboard a week. That way nothing ever gets monumentally out of hand.
• Do the dishes before you go to bed - no matter how late. However tired and hung over you feel it’s easier to face the day with a clean kitchen.
• Always keep your keys in the same place - but not so near the front door they can be burgled!
• Have a birthday chart. Keep it by the calendar in the kitchen and look at it weekly.
• Keep a separate file for all your electrical items, manuals and guarantees. It’s useful for ordering spare parts and checking up when you’ve forgotten how to programme the video when you go on holiday.
• Edit your files. You don’t need every birthday card you’ve received since you were seven or every bank statement since you opened your first post-office savings account. For tax purposes keep all financial documentation for six years; for emotional purposes only mementos with meaning.
• Keep precious documents such as passports, birth certificates, insurance policies, etc, inside a flame-retardant box. Irreplaceable documents should be kept in the bank or with your solicitor, but keep a copy at home for reference.
• Always keep a loaf of bread, a carton of full-fat milk and a pack of butter in the deep freeze. You never know when they might come in useful.
CLOTHES
• Edit your wardrobe. Get rid of anything that is permanently stained, irrevocably torn, or too small. Then add anything you haven’t worn for two years to the pile.
• Invite a friend or family member whose opinion you trust to act as a critic of your entire wardrobe. Discard accordingly.
• Divide your wardrobe into winter and summer clothes. Make sure at the end of each season that clothes are clean, pressed, mended and packed away until they are needed again. This will free you up to see what you really need now.
• Fashion editors keep the boxes that their shoes came in, stick a Polaroid of the pair on the box and stack boxes like a shoe shop. Easy to see, neat to store.
• Buy essentials in multiples - have enough underwear, tights and socks for two weeks.
• Hang up your clothes every night, put your shoes away, and put your dirty laundry in the laundry basket. Then lay out your clothes for the next day, making sure they’re clean and pressed. Morning is not the time to become a maid service.
• Have two laundry baskets - one for whites, one for coloureds. It’s time-consuming to sort the weekly wash, and even more time consuming to deal with clothes that have run due to not being correctly divided.
• Do a wardrobe plan - almost like a weekly menu. For example: Mondays: grey shirt, blue trousers, black shoes; Tuesdays: green suit, white shirt, black boots, etc. Have enough combinations for a two-week rotation to allow for cleaning. Then stick your plan on your wardrobe door.
• Keep a sewing basket by the television. There are few programmes so absorbing that you can’t be doing something else at the same time.
MIND
• In a relationship rut? Talk to a professional. For a list of counsellors in your area, send a large SAE to The British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy, 1 Regent Place, Rugby, Warwickshire CV21 2PJ. 01788 550899.
• Get at least seven hours sleep a night - you will think and work better.
• Take up yoga - it relieves stress and aids concentration.
• Manage your moods. Destructive emotions and obsessive patterns of behaviour are seriously inefficient. Psychologist Anne Dickson’s book Trusting the Tides (Rider, £9.99), is a practical guide to emotional management.
• Decide on a realistic exit time from work and stick to it.
• Become more adventurous. Doing anything new or even slightly
dangerous can give you new insight into life and help you work and live more effectively.
• Eat breakfast. Low blood sugar in the morning sabotages memory, concentration and the ability to think straight.
• Exercise your memory. Train your brain with Total Memory Workout by Dr Cynthia Green (Piatkus, £14.99).
• Set yourself a goal, then make a list of the steps you’ll need to get there. Almost anything is achievable if your break it down into small steps. Or, as the Chinese say, ‘The journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step’.
• Be decisive. Most (not all) decisions are reversible; not making a decision, however, is time consuming for you and for others.
• Delegate as much as possible. Think carefully about each task and decide whether you really need to do it or whether there is someone else who could do it more quickly, more effectively or more cheaply.
Lisa Freedman is a regular contributor to The Daily Telegraph and Woman & Home magazine.
