Staying Organized at Work: A Busy Leader’s Guide

If you’re like many employees in companies across the country, one of your New Year’s Resolutions this year was to (finally…) get organized at work. So, how’s it going? We made it through month one but staying organized takes concerted effort all year round. Plus, when you’re feeling frazzled, it makes staying organized at work and getting things done even more difficult. But before you can organize your work, you’ve got to organize your thoughts. It all starts with a clear head. Read on for some of our top organizational tips for busy leaders.

First: Get Your Head in the Game

First things first, are you getting the sleep, rest and exercise you need? Oh, and also, you better not be skipping meals. In order to get your work ready for peak organization, be sure that you take care of your mind and body first. Fatigue, frustration, and burnout are sure-fire ways to derail your organization's efforts.

Instead, take care of yourself. This means taking breaks. Be sure that you allow yourself time to reflect and chill throughout the day. For many of us, that means putting a break right in the calendar, so it doesn’t get taken up by meetings. Your time is important and to effectively utilize it, you have to use some of it to organize your thoughts.

Second: Planning Ahead, Staying Organized at Work

Review Your Goals: Make sure your goals and priorities are spot-on and you are reviewing them regularly. If you look at your goals once at the beginning of the year and once at the end, you’re sure to fail. Keep them prominent and break down smaller tasks to be sure they are reached.

Don’t let the day-to-day chatter and business distract you from what really matters. Place a time in your calendar each month just to review your goals and take stock of where you are and how far you’ve come. It will shock you how much you’ve already done. This way, you’ll also be ready in case some of your goals need adjusting down the road.

Third: Use Tools to Help You Get There

There are so many online tools that are great for the organization depending on what you are looking for. Trello is a great one. It’s an online vision board, that allows you to organize your projects using cards that are categorized any way you like. Add in the option to collaborate with your team and you have a winner.

Slack is another great tool. Everyone knows about Slack, right? If your team is looking for a platform to plan with the built-in ability to chat, this one’s for you. Finally, if you’re looking to bring all your tools together in one place, Zapier is the one for you. This tool goes one step further by automating your processes through workflows, allowing you to integrate more than 1,000 apps that you use on the regular, like Gmail, Dropbox, and Slack.

Now that you have the focus, the plan and the tools, organization will be a snap. Good luck with your resolution to stay organized this year. And if you’re looking for a way to take some things off your plate for good (from back office and accounting to customer care and creative), check out our outsourcing solutions for non-business-critical tasks, and let us do the hard work for you.