8 Tips to Keep Your Desk Clutter Free

Take a look at your desk right now. Is it clean?

Or perhaps, it is covered in clutter and things that you need to put away.

It’s more difficult to get your work done when your workplace is covered in stuff.

Today, I have 8 tips to help your keep your workspace clean.

A Messy Desk Gets Less Work Done

Clutter, papers, stuff! It’s all over the place. You want to start your work, but there’s no room to work.

Your desk is a mess.

You can push it around, even make piles of it. But, that clutter is keeping you from being productive. You have to do work to clean up, just so you can begin the work you’re supposed to be doing.

Rather than constantly digging yourself out, the best solution is to keep your workspace clean in the first place.

“Keeping your desk free of clutter allows you to be more productive.”

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A workplace that is free of clutter allows you to concentrate on the task at hand. When your workspace is clean you can see your work, you have more space to be creative, and you simply have more “space” to get work done.

Here are 8 Tips to Help You Keep your Desk Clutter Free:

1. Clean Up Before You Start Your Day – Spending a few minutes before you start work each day can make all the difference. Make sure your desk is clean before starting new work.
2. Put It Away – The secret to putting things away is “having a home for each item.” Every item should have a home base where you can put it away. Not only does this make it easier to put things away, but you’ll know where to find them the next time.
3. Avoid Piles – Despite excuses, piles are not productive. They clutter your workspace, making it hard to concentrate on the task at hand.
4. Ditch the Paper and Go Digital – Paper is a common clutter item. Old documents, reports, magazines, receipts, and more. Avoid paper copies when possible. Use a scanner or your phone to scan paper, so that you can discard it.
5. Throw out the Trash – Always have a trash can within reach of your desk. You shouldn’t even have to get up to use it. This will make it much more natural to immediately throw out trash, instead of leaving it on your workspace.
6. Don’t Retain Reference Materials – Once upon a time, it was important to keep instruction manuals and other reference materials. These days you can instantly find this information on the Internet. Lose the random reference documents, manuals, and other miscellaneous reference materials.
7. Don’t Be a Packrat – How much of your clutter could simply be thrown away? Don’t keep things that “you may need someday.” (Hint: Someday never comes.) Only keep things that can’t be replaced.
8. Lose the Books – I recently saw a colleague’s work area that was so cluttered with books that they had taken over his office. Unless you reference books daily considered getting rid of them. Most information can be accessed online. (See #6).

Keeping It Clean

Look at your work space. If it needs some tidying up, do it now. Spend 5-10 minutes doing it, right now.

Do this every day, and soon keeping your workspace clutter-free will be a habit.

And keeping your workspace clean will allow you to get more done.

Question: Do you keep your desk clean? Do you find that a clutter-free workspace lets you get more done? You can leave a comment by clicking here.