"4 Easy Ways to Turn Your Home Office into a Haven"

Do you feel overwhelmed by keeping up with your family’s schedules, appointments, and due dates? Ever found a bill that was due last week shoved in a library book that was due last month? Does your home office look like a tornado whizzed through? We’ve all been there, but being organized doesn’t have to be hard. It’s all about implementing simple systems that work for you and your family.

Here are 4 tips that will help you do just that:
1. Have dedicated office space.
Even if you don’t have an entire room dedicated to an office, at least dedicate a particular desk, bin, closet, or cabinet to being only for your office. This way nothing will get overlooked and everything will have a place. It will also cut down on the clutter from other spaces in your home.

In this space, make sure there is a place for supplies (pens, paper, folders, etc.), a place for files, and a place for incoming mail that needs your attention. This can be as simple as having containers for supplies, a box for filing, and a slot or manila envelope for your inbox.
2. Be picky with your office real estate
Whether your office is in a spare bedroom or in a drawer, be picky with what you allow in your space. Do not bring unopened piles of mail and stacks of magazines into your space. Clutter equals chaos.

Get in the habit of opening mail as soon as you get it from the mailbox. Immediately throw away junk and unnecessary envelopes. Only place documents that are already sorted and need further attention in your inbox (bills and things to be filed). Make it your goal to have fewer and fewer items in your inbox (set up payments and statements online).

3. Purge
Already lost in a sea of office chaos? That’s okay. Shred old statements and financial info, and get rid of anything you don’t use anymore. Fill one garbage bag of items to either donate or throw away every day until you no longer have a clutter problem.

Also implement the one-in-one-out rule: When you bring home a new book, get rid of one.

Use computers to your advantage. Almost every manual ever made can be found online. That means you can toss out those manuals for appliances you haven’t used in 3 years.

4. Never miss a deadline again
Have a certain time each week for sorting through your inbox. Let’s say your “inbox time” is Monday morning when the kids leave for school. If you open a bill on a Tuesday, toss it in your inbox as long as it won’t need your attention before next Monday. If it does, handle it immediately.

Put a bulletin board with a calendar in a central location (like the kitchen) so that you can keep up with what your kid’s have going on. As they get older, let
them be responsible for writing their own action items on the calendar (yearbook money due on the 5th). Just before or after dinner, spend a few minutes going over the calendar as a family. Everyone will know what is happening and develop good organizational habits early on.


Being organized is all about creating systems that work for you and your family. Once your new habits sink in, you won’t ever want to be without them again! Tweet me @brandihamrick with any questions and to let me know how your organization is coming.


YOU GROW, GIRL!

Brandi Hamrick
"The Queen B Coach"
www.thequeenbcoach.com

Brandi Hamrick is a lifestyle expert and success coach who empowers women to go from “busy b” to “Queen B” of their lives and businesses.