If you own a home-based business, bring work home, or use a home office space to manage your bills, paperwork and To-Do lists, this area usually tends to get very messy very quickly. And no matter what the official use of the space may be, when it's a cluttered mess, it's hard to get much done. So here are some tricks and creative ideas to help you get this area organized: 1. Write down the “expiration dates” on any files that store bank statements, credit card or other sensitive information, so you can see them at a glance and know when it's time to shred them (typically after one or two years). 2. Look to the kitchen for help. You can use ice-cube trays or clean egg cups as desk-drawer organizers for small items like paper clips, staples and stamps. 3. Cut down on the wire clutter by bundling together wires that are alike. For example, you can keep the computer speaker wires, together with the radio speaker ones. 4. Stack shelving on your office table and assign separate boxes or containers for each type of paperwork you may have lying around, like: bills that need to be paid, bills already paid, auto information, health info, etc. 5. Come up with your own system of organizing the files. You can arrange them alphabetically or by color-coding. Label each file and then put it in its proper place, so you don't have to turn everything upside down when you need it but can't find it. 6. Keep work-related papers in a separate area from your personal ones. As far away from each other as possible. When you work from home, it's really easy for them to get mixed together. 7. Keep on the outside, only the items that you use most often. The more things you have lying around, the harder it will be to keep everything organized. Not to mention, it's typically harder to stay focused on one task, when you have lots of other things lying around, reminding you of all the things you still need to accomplish. 8. Re-purpose your old Rolodex. With life becoming more and more digital, don't think of the old Rolodex as an item purely for storing business contacts. You can re-purpose it, and use use it to hold temporary receipts and notes with log in information or passwords. 9. Use a lamp with a real metal base as an impromptu magnetic board for any receipts or phone numbers you need right away. 10. Organize your e-mail folder by creating a hierarchy system. You can use either A or 1 in front of each label for the most often used folders, B or 2 for the second most-used, and so forth. See more inbox tips here. For more, check out our blog for weekly tips, and go to our Facebook page. Click 'Like' and join the community to get more ideas for your home, office, and ... life :) US Storage Centers
