10 Practical Organizational Strategies To Advance Your Career
Written By Abena Sey
August 25, 2020
People ask me how I am able to balance having a family, a full-time teaching career, regular blogging and my new business venture as a course developer and educational consultant. Clearly, these are many hats to wear, as each area requires a high level of excellence and attention to detail. Keeping a balance is not easy, but organizing my life made all the difference for me. I got my personal life in order, and as a result was able to increase productivity in my worklife. I learned that the positive habits you develop personally will transfer to your work. Your productivity will increase, because you will be operating from a place of peace and clarity. Here are 10 practical organizational strategies that you can apply to your life and career immediately.
1 - Establish a daily routine. Plan to do your most difficult tasks during a time when you are most productive, and plan to do your easier tasks when you are under less pressure. This strategy works to keep you motivated and focused on your tasks. For some, once you get the harder task out of the way you are more energized by this success to do your easier tasks. For others, doing the opposite works. Some are motivated to continue working once they start checking tasks off their list of things to do. Do whatever strategy works well for you. For me, it largely depends on the task at hand, but a strong motivating tool for me is crossing tasks off my list once I’ve completed them.
I would also highly recommend that you plan a day routine for your time at work and an evening routine for your time at home. This advice applies to everyone, but I especially recommend forming an evening routine to parents. I can speak from personal experience of the times when my children were younger. My work routine was organized and smooth. At work I had established a routine that helped me feel on top of things. I was quickly gaining a reputation as a master teacher. At home, however, I felt like I was barely holding things together. I can laugh at that past experience now, but when I was in the thick of it, I dreaded my evenings because I had not established a routine at home. That has since changed, because I learned to create an evening routine that keeps my family organized and at peace. I continue to adapt the routine to address changes that develop as my children grow. Remember to prioritize planning both your time at work as well as your time after work. The work you devote up front to doing these will result in your ability to be your best at work and at home.
2 - Create systems for things that you routinely do. This takes away the guesswork involved when you are doing a task. You will find that when you create systems for a particular routine task, your productivity and efficiency will increase.
3 - Do as much as you can the night before so that your mornings are smoother. Some things that you do the night before might include preparing meals, choosing the next day’s outfit, packing your work bag or briefcase, ensuring that your childrens’ backpacks are packed (and contains their completed homework, or items needed for special days :) ), or that you have gas in your tank. Your time in the morning is precious, especially if you have a long commute, or have to drop your children to daycare or school before you head to work. You certainly don’t want to lose time in the morning because you weren’t prepared in advance. These are all winning strategies I use to minimize any issues that will result in lost time.
4 - Automate as much as possible. Automating your tasks helps you save time because you will have less decisions to make. Again, your goal is to expend less of your energy on routine tasks so that you can devote extra time to tasks that will help you work towards your career aspirations. Somethings that you could automate are your grocery list, your weekly meals, your exercise routine, or your bedtime routine. When these are automated, you can use the extra time you’ve gained to work on your self-development, whether it is for your hobby or for taking a class for your career development.
5 - Organize your files. When I was a graduate student, this strategy was a game changer for me. I used cloud storage to organize all my files related to graduate school. I organized all digital resources into labeled folders that I categorized and colour coded. This helped me save time, because it was easy to locate the resources I needed. I also apply these cloud storage organizational strategies for all my work files. I mentioned previously that you should automate tasks that you routinely do, and this includes organizing your files. This is also important for those who run a business. You certainly want to keep all your files, such as business expense receipts, organized for easy access when you need them (hint: for tax-time).
6 - De-clutter as much as you can, as often as you can. I once heard it said that a cluttered environment leads to a cluttered mind. I believe this to be true. You don’t want clutter to be a distraction from achieving your goals. You need your mind to be alert and prepared for your day. In your home, consider donating clothing that you no longer wear, or having a garage sale to sell items you no longer use but are taking up space in your home. If there are books you no longer read (or your children are finished reading) consider donating these books to a local library or school. At your place of work, consider donating items you no longer need to new employees. This is particularly helpful if you are a teacher. Over time, it is easy to accumulate a lot of resources as a teacher, especially if you often change teaching assignments. Be a blessing to a new teacher by offering resources that helped you in the past and that you know can help a new teacher be successful in their first year. In your email inbox, consider unsubscribing from email lists that you no longer need. Only keep subscriptions that are relevant to your situation. If you read my blog post about graduating from an online learning program #debtfree, then you know my stance about debt and strategies for how to reduce expenses. Unsubscribing from email subscriptions can be useful to help you resist the urge to spend. Only keep subscriptions that are relevant to your growth. Cue my shameless plug in: Don’t forget to subscribe to my email list to receive updates and great tips to help you achieve success in your field. :)
7 - Clean up after yourself. This will help you keep an organized environment in the office or at home. Focus on one task at a time, and set a timer. You can do a quick 5- or 20-minute clean, depending on the size of the space or the amount of mess. This is a strategy I use for both home and work. I’m not perfect, and not everything in my environment is immaculately cleaned, but I do have an organized space that helps keep my mind at ease and helps me stay productive. Give this strategy a try if you’ve identified keeping your space neat to be challenging.
8 - Put things away when you are finished with them. This strategy contributes to your cleanliness goals and efficiency. For instance, put your keys away in the same spot to avoid losing time in the morning looking for them.
9 - Plan your day the night before. Spend 10-15 minutes the night before writing down your most important tasks for the day. Apply this strategy for both work and home. Be specific. Don’t just write down the task, but the steps and resources needed to get the task done successfully. When you devote time to thoughtfully plan your day, you spend more time executing the task at hand. You eliminate any guesswork, distractions, or discouragement, and you can get to work right away with confidence knowing you have a plan in place.
10 - Plan your day using a journal and a running list. Invest in an organizational tool, like a journal or calendar. You can use whatever platform works best for you, whether it be a hardcopy or digital version. You don’t want to write on a scrap piece of paper that can get lost easily, and you don’t want to simply rely on memory. When you keep a journal, you will have more accountability and can refer to previous entries to measure your progress towards your goals. You can also keep track of important dates, appointments or projects in your journal using a month at-a-glance spread to support your planning process. I recommend using a separate journal for your personal life and your work life. I have multiple journals to keep track of different aspects of my life, however, I use one large fridge calendar to keep track of important dates that apply to my whole family. This helps to reduce schedule conflicts and assists with planning.
I hope that you’ve been inspired to try one or more of these 10 organizational strategies. They worked for me both personally and professionally, and can certainly work for you. Take one step at a time, and one action at a time towards your self-development journey!