Shred-iquette
In: Paper Management
5 Aug 2010
Nothing keeps me busier than paper management. Computer advocates once promised a “paperless society,” but in an age when we are printing out our emails, paper is here to stay for a while.
Before I can get to my best advice on paper management, however, I must first stop and have a conversation about SHREDDING. “Why bother?” You may ask. “Shouldn’t you just shred EVERYTHING to be on the safe side?”
If you are fortunate enough to have one of those big power shredders in your workplace then the answer is simple: Yes. However, for most of us especially those of us working out of a home office, we have to be a little more selective about exactly what paper trash we choose to shred. Otherwise it costs too much in time, money, and energy.
I for one am very vigilant about shredding anything with my credit card number and Social Security number on it, but I figure anyone can access my home address online or from a phone book. If you’re not comfortable with having your address in the recycling bin, however, you should expect to do 20 times as much shredding as I do and that 20 dollar shredder is not going to cut it.
After working with clients we may end up with four boxes of paper to shred and they tell me they are going to shred it while they are watching television, because they are good at multitasking. It’s a fantasy.
I conducted an experiment once on just a quarter of a banker’s box of paper. I have a medium sized shredder and I wanted to see how fast it could shred this quarter box of papers. It was an eye opener. Between the shredder’s overheating and the jamming up and unclogging, it took me the better part of a Sunday, my so called day of rest. I wasn’t rested. I was livid.
If you’ve got a lot of shredding to do, do yourself a favor and trust it to the professionals. My choice is Shred Station Express. They’ll shred 4 banker boxes of paper for about 60 bucks. They are extremely professional and reliable and they even destroy electronic waste.
In case you don’t get their newsletter, here’s the latest, which has a great answer to the question…
Isn’t it cheaper to shred your own paper?
We did a time in motion study with one customer who thought they were saving money by shredding their own paper in a small 10 sheet shredder. Here is what we found.
The customer was having their receptionist do the shredding at her desk, employees would drop off the material in a basket during the day, and the receptionist spent on average 30 minutes at the end of each day shredding.
The receptionist was paid $14.50 an hour ($30,000 a year), with benefits and company paid taxes that came to $19.76. So a half hour cost the company $9.88 a day.
$9.88 a day times 5 days a week equals $49.40 a week. They were convinced that our monthly console service at $39.99 a month was a deal! This does not take into consideration:
**The amount of dust created around her desk.
**The amount of noise created.
**The fact that she had a hard time answering the phone (her real job) while she was shredding.
**The cost to replace the light duty shredder twice a year, or the electricity to run it.
Effective organizing is all about balancing priorities. When it comes to shredding, be aware of the consequences of shredding EVERYTHING and if that’s the path you need to take, seriously consider the irreplaceable time and energy, you are going to devote to it.
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- Tags: shredding
Eat, Drink, and Be Organized!
In: Systems
31 Jul 2010
Coalhouse Pizza is the most wonderful thing to happen to my corner of Stamford since I moved here. This blog, however, is not a restaurant review. It is your key to unlocking clutter. So what does Coalhouse Pizza have to do with organizing?
On Tuesday Coalhouse Pizza featured a beer dinner, five courses of delicious pairings of gourmet food and varieties of Stone Brewing beer. I was in heaven. This foodie/beer boy did not, however, leave the organizer in me at home. I was blown away by how well organized the event was!
Of course, I’m biased, but I believe the success of the operation was down to one MVP: clear work surfaces. Now don’t get me wrong, the planning, the prep work, the team work and the management (Captain Gerard rocks!) were all first rate and indispensable, but in terms of reliable systems to deliver all these features, the clear work surfaces were the unsung heroes.
In past posts I’ve made no secret of the fact that I believe there is no better organizing tool than a clear work surface, but that’s not enough. Every effective organizing system is made up of two vital components: an appropriate structure and an easy habit. If the clear work surface is the ultimate organizing structure, what then is the habit that must accompany it?
A clear work surface must be accompanied by the habit of clearing it between processing, NOT MOSTLY, but 100%, whether this processing concludes at the end of the work day or between courses. The team at Coalhouse Pizza gets this.
They had the challenge of serving 5 courses with 5 different beers to 95 guests. That’s 950 servings in less than 2 hours! There were already lots of pizza-prepping surfaces in that kitchen, but their first order of business was to bring in two extra large tables into the middle of the floor for the major processing task ahead. You can see all the surfaces in the photos above.
As you can also see, these surfaces aren’t mostly clear between courses, they’re 100% clear. How do they know each course is 100% done? Because the surfaces are 100% clear, 100% ready for the next course. That’s the pattern to aspire to for EVERY work surface in your home or place of business.
At Coalhouse Pizza these surfaces are treated as runways for take off, not airplane hangars for storage. Food circulates in, gets prepped, and flies off like airplanes. Of course, for these runways to work here, there must be similar runways in other parts of the restaurant. In the kitchen where the food is cooked there must be clean work surfaces. There must also be clear surfaces to process all the dirty dishes as they are emptied and circulate back from the restaurant floor.
To enjoy a well organized home or office, take a tip from a successful restaurant like Coalhouse Pizza and keep those runway surfaces clear for take-off!
Where Should I Put the Mail?
In: Paper Management
21 Jul 2010
It’s a common question but it has an uncommon answer. Mail doesn’t go anywhere. That’s because it stops being mail the second it comes out of your mailbox.
Bills-to-pay need a home, material-to-read need a home, and statements-to-file need a home, but it’s a mistake to allow the daily collection to take up residence ANYWHERE.
This advice is old, but I have an approach that is new. Seek garbage opportunities instead of action opportunities. After all, you’ve got too many actions on your plate already, right?
Stand over your recycling bin and drop it in. The catalogs with products you don’t need? Drop it in! The bulky prospectus that you’ll never have an interest in reading? Drop it in! The Triple A magazine with information you can find online? Drop it in!
Of course you will rescue the bills, statements, and magazines from the trash, but there are further garbage opportunities. Open the envelopes and toss them. Toss the useless inserts and, if you pay online, toss the return envelopes too.
The goal is to keep as LITTLE as you can. This tidy little massacre should take no more than 3 minutes. If it takes any longer then it becomes something you are less likely to do. Don’t get slowed down by the actions required. Just focus on the basic sorting.
The only action that is required immediately is tossing what you don’t strictly need. Consider it a golden opportunity to make your life easier!
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- Tags: bills-to-pay, mail
De-cluttering Is Natural
In: Clutter Control
19 Jul 2010
Late February brought the arrival of a sad old peace lily plant in our front foyer from our condo neighbors across the way. That’s it in the left hand photo. There was an unspoken understanding that everyone would take care of it. Naturally, no one did.
I don’t think much of unspoken understandings so eventually I decided that I was going to be the caretaker of this poor old plant. As you can see, it was pretty far gone. I needed to take drastic measures to save it, so I did something I am pretty good at. I de-cluttered.
With a plant, of course, it’s called pruning, but I think it is a very similar principal to de-cluttering. Pruning and de-cluttering are both about removing the excess to promote healthy growth.
In the right hand photo you can see the result. Limp dull brown leaves have given way to vibrant shiny leaves and fresh lilies. I cut away all but four of the original leaves, which you can still see. Notice how much they have benefited from having space to grow.
I have been in households that are every bit as cluttered as the first plant photo. By removing the trash and excess clutter, we can allow these homes to breathe new life, in much the same way I allowed this plant to breathe new life, by removing the dead and excess leaves. Excess leaves block light and drain water from new growth. Clutter drains space, time, energy and other limited resources.
Sometimes it’s difficult to let go of something that’s no longer serving you well (especially if you spent a lot of money on it), but it helps if you look at what you are gaining. Even though space, time, and energy are not visible gains, I think the plant photo on the right does a pretty good job of illustrating their benefits.
A regular de-cluttering is as important to a healthy household as a regular pruning is to a healthy plant. It’s only natural.
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- Tags: de-cluttering, pruning
Organized Culture
In: Systems
11 Jul 2010
Last week I had the pleasure of watching Othello in the park in Greenwich. The pleasure was heightened because the event was so well organized.
To be honest, I was in no mood to go because I had just finished a day of physically and mentally draining work and I just wanted to relax, but I had made a promise to my wife. I needed the event to be easy and relaxing. I was pleasantly surprised to discover it was both.
I have experienced far too many events that have “done me bold and saucy wrongs.” They are intended to be fun and relaxing, but just aren’t. The culprit: disorganization. Mostly it’s about the need to establish simple boundaries.
Our theater was an open field, which could have meant open chaos. Instead, simple paths were mapped out with secured rope. There was a well-marked section in front for people with blankets, a well-marked section behind that for people with low chairs, and the same in the back for people with full-sized chairs. If there was any question about whether a chair was blocking someone’s view, there were actually attendees with yardsticks to monitor the situation. As a result EVERYBODY could enjoy the performance.
What strikes me is that it doesn’t take much to make a potentially chaotic situation into a pleasant one. Take, for example, ordering food from a deli. The simple take-a-number system means that people can relax while they are waiting, because there can be no dispute over who was there first.
Beside the well-sectioned audience, there was plenty of garbage cans that were well delineated between recycling and regular trash. And miracle of miracles people didn’t feel the need to litter!
I thought there was still a pretty good possibility the lovely evening would be spoiled in a traffic jam out of the parking lot, but no. There were policemen directing traffic and we were on our way home within just a few minutes. Smooth as silk!
We’ve got Macbeth this week in Stamford. I’m not sure if it’s indoors or outdoors. If it’s anything like our Greenwich experience, I’ll look forward to it either way.
About Matt Baier Organizing
Professional Organizer Matt Baier and his team declutter and organize homes and offices in Stamford, New Canaan, Greenwich, Westport, Darien, Norwalk, Fairfield, Westchester County, and New York City.
Topics
- Clutter Control (32)
- Floor Planning (4)
- Paper Management (18)
- Systems (41)
- Closet (10)
- Time Management (11)
- Shred-iquette
- Eat, Drink, and Be Organized!
- Where Should I Put the Mail?
- De-cluttering Is Natural
- Organized Culture
- Clean Slate of Mind
- Organizing Business Cards
- Organizing Lessons From Your Bathroom
- Keep the Ball in Play
- The ABC’s of Storage
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