How to Get Organized Without Resorting to Arson : A Step-By-Step Guide to Clearing Your Desk Without Panic or the Use of Open Flame

The Secrets of Your Organizing Style Learn about yourself, co-workers, partners, spouse, and others, and why each has a different Organizing Style. Why do they each work so differently? How can you support them? What are the best organizing techniques to use? 1(1) The First Part of Your Organizing Style Your Work Personality 2(1) The First Work Personality is the Sparklebrain 3(3) The Symbol for Sparklebrain is 4(1) How to Spot a Sparklebrain 5(1) The Second Work Personality is the Linear 6(3) The Symbol for Linear is 8(1) How to Spot a Linear 8(1) A Story about a Linear and a Sparklebrain ``Getting It'' 9(2) The Third Work Personality is the Cross-Dominant 11(5) The Symbol for Cross-Dominant is 13(1) How to Spot a Cross-Dominant 14(2) The Second Part of Your Organizing Style is Your Access Type 16(2) Do You Access Visually? 18(1) Do You Access Spatially? 19(2) Do You Access Chronologically? 21(9) How To Access Your Inner Organizer What's an Inner Organizer? Do you have one? If so, how can you use it to make your organizing project easier? 26(4) How Does a Three Smell? Take This Test! 30(2) There Are No Wrong Answers 32(1) Why You Can't Get Organized in Traditional Ways 32(2) What's That on Your Mind? 34(2) How to Find Your True Organizing Goal When people talk about getting organized, they can mean very different things. What do you mean when you say you'd like to be organized? What is your true organizing goal? 36(1) What Organizing Is and Isn't 36(2) What It Is 36(1) What It Isn't 37(1) What's Your Organizing Goal? 38(6) You're Not Disorganized, Your Office Is! How does paper flow through your office? If it's not flowing, why not? Read this chapter and the next one before you start blocking out time to get organized 43(1) Where Paper Flow Starts 44(1) Catchers and Blockers 44(1) The Secrets of Flow 45(6) How to Blame Your Disorganization on Your Furniture Why does disorganization have so much to do with furniture placement? Could getting organized be as simple as moving the furniture? 47(1) Be sure you read this before you go out to buy the organizing supplies described in Chapter 6 47(4) Good and Bad Arrangements 51(1) A Bad Example: Is This Your Office? 51(1) One Simple Secret to Organizing 52(1) How Your Furniture is Causing U to Become Disorganized 52(2) How to Get Your Furniture to Organize U 54(2) The Geographical Distortion Theory 56(1) How to Stash Your Trash 56(1) Don't Trip Up the Traffic 57(3) Your Ideal Furniture Arrangement 60(1) Furniture Arrangement Tips 61(4) Nine Supplies You Need to Get Organized What supplies will you need to get organized? Here's the list for every Organizing Style. You can buy these the same day you start organizing, or weeks in advance 65(1) The Supply List that Will Save You 65(5) Supplies to Avoid Buying at All Costs 70(3) Good Containers, Bad Containers 73(4) Setting the Stage for Getting Organized How can you make sure you don't lose important papers while you're getting organized? Should you ``clean for the cleaning people?'' 77(1) Use this chapter the same day you start organizing your office. This is the preparation---we'll start the step-by-step organizing process in chapter 8 77(1) How long will it take to get organized? There's no way to predict---everybody's different 77(1) You Must Have a Central Headquarters 77(2) How to Keep People Out of Your Stuff 79(1) How to Get More Work Surface 80(4) From Here to Efficiency This is the chapter in which we start organizing your office, step by step. Be sure you've read the prior chapters or you'll have no idea what's going on 83(1) Remember your Work Personality and Access Type? You're going to need them for this section, so if you want a reminder, go back and reread chapter 1 83(1) Starting with this chapter, you will begin to see what I call ``Magic Questions''. These questions are designed to help you become self-sufficient in organizing. Your answers will tell you what steps to take for your special Organizing Style. The more you practice asking yourself these questions, the easier organizing gets. Eventually, all you will need is the questions---not the whole book 83(1) In fact, there is a summary of the Magic Questions at the end of this book for just that purpose 83(1) Handle Paper Twice: Why Breaking the Rules will Improve Your Results 84(1) When You Can Let Paper Sit 85(2) Organizing in the Olden Days 87(1) The New Terminology 87(1) How Verbs Can Save You Tons of Time 87(2) Magic Question #1 89(5) How to Get Paper to Keep Moving Itself 94(1) Why Your Words Are So Important 95(2) How to Find Your Stuff When You Need It 97(1) The Advantages of Verbing 97(2) Chaos Control: What to Do with All That Pending Paperwork What should you do with all your verbed tasks waiting to be done? How can you keep your desk clear? When is all this stuff going to get finished? 99(1) An Introduction to Controlling the Piles 99(1) Step by Step, Getting Your Paperwork Under Control 100(6) Is It Working Yet? 106(1) Fooling Yourself for Fun and Profit 106(5) How Being Silly Can Get You Organized 108(1) Where to Keep Your Controlled Paper 109(2) How to Handle Evolving Paperwork 111(1) The Advantages of Being a Control Freak 112(7) What To Do When Your Workload Overflows 114(5) A Story About Too Darn Much Paper 119(1) Partners in Slime: To Share or Not to Share? 120(1) Your Word is Gospel 120(1) What to Do When Your To-Dos are Coming Due 121(1) Magic Question #2 122(3) When One To-Do Has More Than One Due Date 125(3) Magic Question #3 128(1) Latering a To-Do 128(2) Magic Question #4 130(1) Soonering an To-Do 131(2) How to Get the Help You Need How much work is too much? Which items can you delegate? How can you store tasks until they are delegated? How can you get them to your helpers in the most effective manner? What helpers? 132(1) The Secret to Delegating: Naming Names 133(1) When No One Can Do it But You 133(1) Magic Question #5 134(3) How Henry Ford Delegated the Model T 137(1) If You Have No One to Whom You Can Delegate 138(2) How to Get Tasks to Your Helper 140(1) Magic Question #6 141(1) Magic Question #7 142(1) More Delegation Tips 143(4) How to Relieve the Tyranny of To-Do Lists How does your To-Do list work with all this? How can you turn your To-Dos into To-Dones faster and more efficiently? 147(1) I Just Got Organized and My In-Bin is Full Again! 147(1) The Cure for, ``What Did I Come in Here For?'' 148(1) A Genius and His Memory: Einstein 149(1) How to Stop Carrying the Little Things 150(3) How To Do the Core Memory Dump 150(3) A Cool To-Do Trick 153(2) The Last Time You'll Ever Have to Rewrite a To-Do List 155(1) Magic Question #8 156(1) How to Deal with New To-Dos 157(2) Avoiding a Typical Organizing Trap 159(2) Latering Again 161(1) Magic Question #9 161(2) How to Simplify Projects Why does some paperwork take so much longer than other paperwork? Why does work keep expanding, or does it just seem that way? What's the best way to corral all the related items when they won't fit into a regular file? 163(1) How Some Paperwork Has Been Fooling You 163(2) Why It's OK if Your Desk is Full 165(1) How Multiple To-Dos Sneak Up on You 166(2) Where to Keep Bulky Projects 168(1) How to Store Smallish Projects 168(2) How to Store Largish Projects 170(5) How to Maximize Findability How many times have you had to stop working to find something? Is there a better way to place things so you'll always find them easily? 175(1) Why ``A Place For Everything'' Doesn't Always Work 175(1) Magic Question #10 176(1) How to Find Things 177(1) Magic Question #11 178(1) Only You Get to Decide Where You Want Things 178(2) Magic Question #12 180(1) Three Ways to Set Things Up So You Can Access Them Easily 180(4) How to Stay Organized Without Resorting to Discipline OK! You understand your Organizing Style, Work Personality, and Access Type. You've verbed your papers, flowed your furniture, dated your priorities, and binned and shelved your projects. Now let's put it all together 184(1) How Not to Lose Your Stuff 184(2) How to Keep from Running Around 186(1) What Mode Are You In? 186(1) How to Keep from Getting Stuck Again 186(4) How to Keep Your Desk Clear 190(1) How to Get Rid of Filing Fast How will you ever get around to your filing, much less get to the bottom of it? 191(1) When You Can Procrastinate Filing 191(1) How Long Can You Put Off Filing? 192(1) How to Make Filing Easier 193(1) Magic Question #13 194(1) How to Remove the Pressure to File 195(1) If You Just Aren't Filing 195(1) When Filing Still Isn't Getting Done 196(1) Getting Help with Your Filing 196(1) Magic Question #14 197(2) When Your Helper Doesn't Know Where to File Things 198(1) Should You Color Code Your Files? 199(1) How to Reduce Interruptions What really causes interruptions? Can they be controlled? Whose fault are they? 200(1) A Trick to Getting Back on Track 200(1) Who Interrupts You Most Often? 201(1) How to Get People to Leave You Alone So You Can Work 202(1) How to Explain How Busy You Are 203(1) Controlling Interruptions 204(2) When You Get the Urge to Purge What should you toss out, and when should you toss it? Who can keep all their stuff, and who should let theirs go? Learn why the traditional rules are wrong, and review a generic list of stuff to keep versus stuff to toss 206(1) How to Know What Clutter Must Go 206(1) When Purging is Painful 207(1) Calling All Hoarders 207(1) The Collyer Brothers: Real Hoarding 208(1) Not Sure Whether to Let Something Go? 208(1) Magic Question #15 209(1) Sentimental Value vs. Throwing Things Out 210(1) How to Get Someone Else to Throw Their Stuff Away 210(3) Who Has Time to Toss? 213(1) Here Are Those Lists 213(1) Throw These Things Out 213(2) Recycle These 215(1) Stuff to Keep 216(3) Optional ``Keep'' List 219(3) Recapping the Magic Questions Whenever you want to review this book, turn to this chapter. Go through these questions and you'll remember what you've learned 220(1) If you don't have an answer for the first question, go to the second. If the second doesn't do the job, go to the third, and so on 220(1) The more you practice these questions, the less you will need to pay outside organizing help 220(2) Index 222