Are you searching for that important paper and can’t find it anywhere? Your time’s up! Your cleaning schedule is long overdue. Though putting your home office in order can be a pretty daunting task (especially if you are a clutter bug like me), it is not undoable.
Here are some best ways to organize a home office:
- Get into the cleaning mode.
- Deal one place at a time.
- Arrange the desk.
- Give a home for everything, big or small.
- Clean Up the Drawer Space.
- Utilize Vertical Space.
- Sort the Mess.
- Simplify the stuff.
- Manage the paper clutter.
- Use technology to organize.
- Choose a color scheme for the workspace.
- Keep the space ventilated and well-lit
- Install power points.
- Maximize Storage Space.
- Compartmentalize Large Cabinets.
- Label with Labels.
- Get Suitable Furniture.
- Set Boundaries.
- Clean Regularly.
Living with growing clutter around us is one step away from purgatory. However, disorganization doesn’t come without a cost, the cost being our sanity and peace of mind. When you have to search for every single thing, it drives you crazy.
Read on further to make our home office cleaning mission from impossible to possible and reality, and make our workspace look ethereal.
How To Organize Your Home office?
As far as organizing the home office goes, workflow, function, and space are the key factors. Anything outside this is considered clutter. So, let’s start by cleaning where it matters the most.
1. Get Into The Cleaning Mode:
To get started, you first need the mindset to begin cleaning. The realization that the disarray has gone off limits should motivate you to initiate your cleaning work today; tomorrow never comes. So, let today be that day.
Make a cleaning schedule keeping your ability in mind, and vow to stick to it. Follow the plan religiously. Once you get the hang of it, I bet you will be unstoppable.
2. Deal One Place At A Time:
Though now you are in an excellent mood for cleaning, the long amassed clutter can be a bit overwhelming. So, one step at a time is the best approach to handle this.
First, go from the most familiar workspaces to the least familiar – your workstation, storage spaces like cubby holes, shelves, organizers, and drawers, one at a time. This way, you will do justice by giving ample time to every zone, so the cleaning process isn’t too demanding.
3. Arrange The Desk:
All the while, your desk had been silently screaming for your attention – papers strewn around, stacked up files and folders, sticky notes from yesteryear, a dirty coffee mug sitting snuggly, snack dish transformed into an abode of small things, coffee stains, stapler, pens, and an assortment of all sorts of things, from keys to paper pins – much like fusion art.
Remove all the stuff from the table and wipe it clean. Place your laptop back in its place. Salvage other things like the pen or mobile stand and give them a spot on your table. Keep only bare necessities; don’t overcrowd this space. The more free space you have, the better will be your work temperament.
Keep the rest of the stuff temporarily in a box till you can find a place for them.
4. Give A Home For Everything – Big Or Small:
Every article deserves a house for itself. So, assign all your home office essentials and supplies to a proper place. Tuck away the rarely used items safely somewhere, in a box. Give preference to the most used ones and keep them where you can find them at your hands’ reach.
5. Clean Up The Drawer Space:
With the desk space sorted, it’s time to move on to your drawers. Again, if cleaning your drawers can be intimidating, choose to do one at a time. Prioritize the drawers according to their usage and tidy them. The topmost ones are the most used; pick them first.
Empty and vacuum the drawers, sponge the dust and dirt out, and leave the drawers open till they dry. It’s the best place for office essentials like scissors, staplers, push pins, paper clips, and other tiny office requirements. Establish organizers in the top drawers, so the stationaries don’t jumble up when pulling the drawers out.
Rearrange the other drawers. Use organizers where necessary. Move out stuff that does not belong to the drawer space.
6. Utilize Vertical Space:
This often ignored space is an excellent place for storage in your workstation. Install cubby holes or shelves to store your office supplies. Purchase some attractive folder organizers for this space and keep your folders here. Also, remember that this is a fantastic place to store significantly large items that don’t fit in other areas.
How To Declutter Your Home Office?
Once you finish cleaning all the areas, it’s time to go through all the jumble and sort them. Again, getting rid of unwanted articles and making space for those that deserve it is the key to successful decluttering.
1. Sort The Mess:
Once you finish cleaning, sorting the mess is the next challenging task. Now that you have given a place for each item, even as you sort, you can put away things in their designated location. Next, weed out unwanted, broken, and outdated things and dispose of them.
Being the final decision maker, you know the useful ones from the rest. So, categorize them accordingly.
Now be prudent not to let unnecessary things backflow. Instead, ask yourself these three crucial questions for all your items.
- When was the last time I used this item?
- Do I really need this?
- Would I buy this now if you don’t have this?
If your answers are affirmative, keep the item. Else donate it or dump it.
2. Simplify The Stuff:
Another vital step to organize is simplifying your stuff.
Let’s be practical here! Is it possible for your space to stay spic and span if you put everything back (say after a massive cleanup)? No! Then what is the solution?
The best solution is to simplify your things. If you keep putting back everything you had before, honestly, you aren’t doing anything here. You need to change your approach to being a minimalist to make a difference.
The truth is that maintaining the vast collection you prefer to keep will consume you and is tiring and exhausting. So, store stuff that can convince you of its usefulness, and the rest have to go. Purging can be remedial and rejuvenating, trust me!
Photo by Viktor Talashuk / Unsplash
What Are Some Best Tips For A Home-Office Organization?
1. Manage Your Paper Clutter:
Of all your office junk, paper is the most notorious one. Once you segregate all the paper junk, you have dealt with 80% of your mess, or at least it seems so.
File your papers and keep the necessary files in your cabinets or shelves. And stow away the rest of the folders elsewhere. Lastly, trash unwanted pieces of paper in the garbage or shred them for compost.
2. Use Technology To Organize:
If you have minimal storage space at your home work station, consider scanning and saving documents that you need to access often for reference or perusal. Maintaining soft copies of your records allows you to pick up the necessary papers as and when required. No more folders, dusty cabinets, and decluttering!
3. Choose A Color Scheme For The Workspace:
Yes, that’s right! Picking up your favorite color scheme to decorate your home office inspires you to hang around it more often and keep it clean and tidy. So, if you have dull colors in your home office, pick up a color scheme of your choice or paint it all in shades of white to make it look divine. In addition, the right choice of colors can boost your work morale. So, choose your hues right.
4. Keep The Space Ventilated And Well-Lit:
Open up the windows and allow fresh air to come in. The sun streaming inside the workspace is a welcome change as it brightens you and the office. As a result, a peppy mood and a happy mindset will make you more productive and less stressed.
5. Install Power Points:
Are wires hanging everywhere – PC, monitor, printer, and phone chargers? Wires are a necessary hassle. However, it’s easy to keep them out of sight when you don’t need as many wires.
- Install power outlets on the side of the desk or under them.
- Drill in a grommet hole on your table and hide the spot with a desk grommet.
- Run the cord through the hole.
- Fasten the cable tightly to the desk’s leg with a tag and run it down to the main electrical point.
- Prevent tripping hazards by properly masking the wires.
Another alternative is to go wireless. Though it’s impossible to get rid of power cords, you can always reduce the cord’s length by installing power outlets nearby.
- Utilize the USB port on your laptop to charge your phone.
- Opt for hardware with plug-ins.
- Wireless mouse, wireless keyboard, wireless charger, wireless monitor, and so on are wise options.
Ingenious and careful planning of wire layout in your home office setting can eliminate ugly, tangled wires everywhere.
6. Maximize Storage Space:
Where digital storage is not an option, you need a lot of storage space for physical office supplies. Increasing your storage space is the best solution. For example, establish shelves, cubby holes, and cabinets near the work area to store your stuff tidily.
7. Compartmentalize Large Cabinets:
Do you have oversized cabinets with loads of spare space? Not a problem!
Construct new compartments in the cubbies or shelves as necessary and use dividers to arrange office supplies efficiently. Make the most of every nook and corner of your shelves, drawers, and cabinets by carefully planning and dividing them for additional space for storage.
Get stackable, transparent plastic bins if you are not a Tinkerbell and uncomfortable around tools. Divide your supplies among them, and stack them up. Make DIY dividers for drawers using cardboard, and they are good to go!
8. Label With Labels:
Labeling is an essential step as it takes that extra mile to keep things organized. When you label your stuff, you tell everyone and yourself that you are organized and that everything has a place.
Label every compartment, section, divider, box, file, and folder to tell you what goes in there. Now, it is not only easy to find your things, but also it is easy to put them back in their appropriate places.
Photo by Gian Paolo Aliatis / Unsplash
9. Get Suitable Furniture:
When it comes to decorating or revamping our home office, we tend to make a lot of compromises. But a comfortable chair with an armrest and a desk of appropriate height is not one of them. So, invest in a good pair of these if the ones you already own are not up to par. When it concerns health, there is no compromise.
10. Set Boundaries:
Maintaining a home office can be difficult, especially if you have small kids in your home who don’t understand that your office desk is your workspace. Teach them gently that no one has permission to use the desk, except you.
When they see you paying extra attention to your workspace and keeping it clean, they will learn to respect your workspace and privacy.
11. Cleaning Regularly:
Your home office is now a sanctuary. Having accomplished decluttering and rearranging successfully, maintain it that way. To achieve this:
- Clean your workspace daily.
- At the end of the workday, set aside a five-minute cleaning schedule.
- Put papers, folders, pens, files, and others back to their original places and give a quick wipe to your desk area.
With little energy and time, your office is now sparkling clean once again.
Disorganization of your work spot can cause stress and make you less productive. But, on the other hand, purging all the unnecessary stuff out of the way will help you breathe free, and as a result, you would love to hang around your office longer and be more efficacious.
Cheers to WFH!
