This Week's Guest Article:

The High Price of Being Disorganized  by Jerri Udelson

Do you spend 15 minutes a day looking for your keys? Or half an hour searching through scraps of paper in your wallet to find the client's phone number you were sure you'd written on the back of an envelope (or was it on that dry cleaning receipt)? Did you intend to get started on that marketing project first thing Monday morning," only to find yourself spending two hours scrolling through your e-mail and then reading trade publications?

Disorganization and poor time management have a very high price: If you spend five minutes a day on the phone on hold you are spending over 20 hours a year waiting. At $40.00 an hour for your time, this is costing either you or your company more than $800.00 annually for this time waster. At $100.00 an hour, it's costing over $2000.00 a year! If the first 15 minutes of a meeting are typically spent waiting for other attendees to arrive, the yearly cost of waiting time can run into thousands of dollars--not to mention the high cost of having meetings run on unnecessarily or having people attend who are not essential to the meeting.

If you find you're not using your time as well as you'd like.... if you're spending hours playing telephone tag, searching through stacks of paper on your desk, rewriting memos you forgot to save on the computer, then here are a few tips to help you get organized:

1. To get maximum focus in a minimum amount of time: Determine the time of day that you have the most energy and best ability to concentrate. Schedule projects requiring your undivided attention in two-hour blocks of time during these "peak energy periods." Hold phone calls, close the office door and work. You can accomplish as much as eight hours of productive work in two two-hour peak energy periods daily.

2. Schedule time for yourself to plan and organize your day. Make an appointment with yourself (in ink) in your date book or on your PDA and keep it.

3. When planning and scheduling a major project, allow extra time, since things usually take much longer than anticipated.

4. Set up office systems to support you. Reorganize your files so that the most important information is in the top drawer at the front of the files and easily retrievable. Purge files twice a year. There is no need to save every piece of paper that crosses your desk, but if you do save something, file it so that you can find it again easily.

5. When organizing your office, put active files, supplies, books and other materials you constantly use close at hand, either on top of the desk or in the drawers. Put secondary materials you occasionally use farther away from your desk. Archive files you no longer use but must keep for legal and tax purposes.

6. Finally, allow time at the end of each day to review your "to do" list, to cross off items you've accomplished, and to reschedule other tasks for a later time. Put away papers and other materials on your desk so that you can begin anew the next day.

Try these tips and you may find your life running more smoothly, with less disorganization and stress and more time available for your own goals and priorities.

 

Jerri Udelson, MCC, principal of Entrepreneurial Coaching and Consulting Services, has been a business/life coach for the past 18 years. She specializes in working with business owners and self-employed professionals who want to create successful businesses and also have great lives; and people in career transition who seek to re-invent themselves and/or create a more satisfying and meaningful retirement. Her coaching includes helping clients stay focused on their own priorities, become and stay organized, and produce results quickly and easily. Jerri is a Master Certified Coach and the founder of International Coaching Week. She recently moved to Santa Fe from the Boston area.