Take A Challenge – Clear Your Desk

Clear your desk, clear your mind!

Sometimes our workspace gets a little out of control with too many documents, stationery and who knows what.

Before we know it we’re working off a patch of desk the size of a post-it note.

This isn’t to say a minimalist worktop is necessary to be productive. However, if the contents on your desk infringe on your ability to work freely and efficiently then I propose it’s time for action.

The good old fashioned remedy is to block out time to clear, sort and organise.

But today we’ll take a different approach. A challenge.

An effective way to understand what you really and truly need is to wipe the slate clean and conduct a live test of your working habits.

We may think we need everything on our desk, but reality can often surprise us.

Why?

In isolation, any given item – desk accessory, stationery, etc – could be useful or might be useful. But is it useful to you? If not, the offending object should be banned at once. 

By conducting an assessment during real work time, it will quickly become clear what you truly reach for, and what you don’t. Anything else is taking up valuable space.

How do you know what’s truly essential? Here’s one way to find out.

Take the ‘Clear Your Desk’ Challenge for a week:

The Clearance: Place all contents from your desktop into a box or two that will temporarily house everything during the challenge, keeping the box(es) near your desk.

Clean Start: Removing all items from an area is always a great opportunity for a thorough anti-bacterial clean. Evict the dust bunny colonies and hit the nooks and crannies you seldom ever see.

Bare Minimum: First return only the essential working staples, e.g. computer or laptop, phone. Avoid the temptation to return anything else just yet, be strict about what is essential.

Start From Now: Resume business. As you begin your work, you can add anything back that you legitimately need or use, but nothing more. Keep this up over the course of the week.

Bin The Box: At the end of the week take a glance in the box and assess what’s left. Do you need to keep any of the items at all? If not, bin, recycle or offer to someone else. If what you have needs retaining, return it to its rightful home. If the item doesn’t have a home, assign it one – just be sure it doesn’t return to your desk.

You’ll work much more efficiently, productively and focused when your desk is clear of everything but the essentials.

Start the ‘Clear Your Desk Challenge’ today.