The Very Worst Organizing Advice
I have written about the worst ways to get organized before, but today I want to focus on just one. If you are helping a friend or family member get organized, the worst piece of advice you can give them is: “when in doubt, throw it out.”
Good Structure Means Good Organizing
I have to admit, I was a big fan of TLC’s What Not To Wear. One of the things the hosts consistently recommended for the wardrobes of the poorly-dressed, was more structure. An important part of our organizing recommendations is also structure. Here are three good examples.
3 Filing Supplies I Hate and Why
On the whole, I try to avoid negative posts, but I’ve had it these guys. The organizing solutions we provide, mostly come down to editing and approach, but sometimes they are purely structural. It could partly be that you are just using the wrong supplies. Over the last ten years of organizing, we have found these three culprits used in hundreds of homes, as indispensable organizing conventions. Indispensable they are not.
Organizing Lessons From the Boutique
After we have purged the excess stuff from a client’s home, we have a conversation about how best to organize and store what’s left. This involves a discussion about the showroom vs. stockroom approach, which I have written about before. This time, I want to revisit the showroom vs. stockroom approach, with the aid of two useful images.
Good Organizing Is Not About Hiding
Does the bag, in this photo to the right, look familiar? I see so many bags like these in client’s homes that I have a name for them. I call them make-it-go-away bags. Mail and other junk tends to pile up on the dining table or on the kitchen counter and when company is coming over, this stuff is hastily swept into a bag, which is hidden in a closet, a cabinet, or a more remote room. While there is an impetus to create these make-it-go-away bags, there is no impetus to process them. The problem is, of course, these bags have a way of accumulating and important things can go missing.
August 2014, Around The House on AM 1490 WGCH
Steve Gladstone interviews Matt about the causes of clutter and what to do about it.
What I Have Learned In 10 Years Of Helping People Get Organized
Matt Baier Organizing was launched on September 1, 2004. In the ten years since, I have learned much about the business of organizing and how best to serve others. Here are some examples.
Can Getting Organized, Bring You A Vacation Every Day?
Are you attached to your stuff? I hear this from clients all the time. It’s provided as an explanation for why there is too much stuff in their homes. There’s nothing wrong with being attached to something. Attachments bring us comfort. However, it is important to be aware of what we are attached to. If we are attached to too much, we get weighed down, and we can’t go anywhere.
Back To School Organizing, Z to A
Over the weekend I made the mistake of going into Staples for some boxes I needed. As I should have anticipated, the store was overrun with back-to-school shoppers. As I waited in a very long line, I couldn’t help but notice how similar the stacks of new spiral notebooks I saw awaiting purchase resembled the stacks of used spiral notebooks I see in my clients’ basements and attics.
Good Organizing Means Good Sharing
We’ve all heard the classic organizing mantra “a place for everything and everything in its place.” That may be a good place to start, but to truly benefit from being organized, it’s necessary to push that goal a little further.
Finding Space in Your File Drawer
One of the many factors that compromise productivity is an overwhelming pile of papers on one’s desk. Often the cause of this excess, is a lack of space in one’s file drawers. That’s a pretty easy problem to solve. Here are three tips to create file space.
Book Review: Effortless Entrepreneur
Effortless Entrepreneur is not an organizing book, but it does emphasize the importance of systems and it uses one of my favorite services as a model. It was written by Nick Friedman and Omar Soliman, the co-founders of College Hunks Hauling Junk. I had the pleasure of meeting Nick at the NAPO Conference this past May. He featured his services at the expo, then delivered the best presentation I saw all week: How To Work “On,” Not “In,” Your Business.
