photo courtesy of striatic

Don’t Agonize, Organize – Florynce Kennedy

Productivity is never an accident. It is always the result of a commitment to excellence, intelligent planning and focused effort – Paul J Meyer. Top 8 Productivity Hacks will help you become productive (as is obvious). It consists of some tips, tricks and ideas to make you more efficient.

Productivity Hack #5 – A Place For Everything And Everything In It’s Place

Do you have to search for keys everyday? Or have a pile of clothes on the bed (all over the house actually)? Is your drawer full of important papers in which you just can’t find the one you are looking for? Then this old adage can do wonders for you – ‘A place for everything and everything in it’s place’.

• Allocate Place(s) For Everything:

  Have dedicated place(s) for each and every item in the house. While usually, one place is preferred, you can also have multiple places based on your convenience. Just remember, the more places you assign to an object, the more places you will have to look for it.

  For instance, we have small wooden containers at central locations in the house – it’s usually used for keys, cards, coins etc. Stuff which you might want to empty out of your pockets once you return home. Having multiple containers ensures that we don’t get lazy and put them anywhere since one is always accessible.

• Rarely Used Items:

  For rarely used items like candles, torch, papers etc, rather than thinking where to place them, think where will you search for them – this usually will give you the right place for those items. This also comes handy when you are filing papers.

• Tag Items:

  It is very easy to dump everything in suitcases and put them in attic. However, when time to search comes, it gets really difficult. This destroys the entire purpose of organizing everything well. Hence, tag items – use a post it or stick a label and write down everything you have in your suitcases, boxes etc.

  For ease of use, it is also practical to put same kind of stuff together. So that you don’t have to go through everything to find what you need.

• Place Items Back Immediately:

  The entire purpose of allocating place(s) is to use them correctly. As soon as you finish using the item, place it back immediately. Do not keep it for later. You already know … later never comes.

  This is applicable even if you are in a hurry. It won’t take you more than five seconds (one minute max) to put items back in order. So do that right now instead of keeping it for later. Coming back to an untidy house or work place is de-motivating.

• Enroll Others:

  You cannot do this alone. Everyone who lives in the house has to take responsibility to keep it clean. If there are kids, then you train them to place everything back into it’s place. You would be doing yourself and them a big favour by taking time to teach this.

• Improvise:

  If you are following this system well, and placing everything back most of the time, the items which don’t get placed usually are giving you a feedback – that the place allocated to them is not right. Simply put, if your system is not easy to use, chances are you will skip using the system or not enjoy it. Hence, keep improvising till you find an ideal location for each.

• Have A Clean House Routine:

  After the habit to put things back to their place is formed, everything remains organized. However, when you are starting with this, chances are lot of things will not be kept back in the right place. Hence, have a clean house routine – that is, have a fixed time every day when you will tidy up entire house. The more times you can do this, the better it is. Initially it might seem that this is taking up time, however, as you keep doing this everyday, you will find lesser and lesser things to put back in place.

Elsewhere:
Mise en Place is a French phrase which means “putting the right thing in the right place”. Marelisa at Abundance Blog explores how can you use Mise en Place as a productivity tool with practical example of applying the same to weight loss and de-cluttering and organizing.

Read Other Hacks:
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