Are you still motivated about your resolutions? Each year, many of us set resolutions to get organized, lose weight or save money. These are often among the top 5 resolutions set each year.

Did you have a “Blue Monday”? The trouble is that some of us give up on our resolutions before we even get half way through January. In fact researchers dubbed the term “Blue Monday” because so many of us are bummed out from already abandoning our resolutions. This year, Blue Monday falls on January 21, 2013.

Are you ready to kick the blues? Here’s a little secret…resolutions often fail because while we state our intentions, we rarely take the time to lay out a plan for getting there. This year I encourage you to abandon your resolutions without guilt and instead make SMART goals instead.

The key to staying productive is to not only have a vision but to also make an action plan! When we make resolutions it’s like making a wish list of things you want. When we make SMART goals, we make plans on how we’re going to accomplish the things that are important to us.

SMART Goals Keep Us Productive

SMART goals keep us focused and productive because they are Specific, Measurable Action-oriented, Realistic and Timely.

So go ahead, pick something on your wish list and put it through the SMART goal test.
I’ve used organizing an office as an example, but this works for anything you want to set:

Take each item on your list and set SMART goals for each of them. Kick it up a notch and partner with someone to help you reach each goal. Make this the year you actually get things done!

Nicole helps clients connect, communicate and collaborate more productively. A former marketer with a BA in Psychology and an MA in Communications, Nicole helps small business owners and entrepreneurs achieve better workflow and personal productivity. She is a speaker, author, trainer and the Chief Visionary of Visions Productivity Solutions in Lake Ridge, VA.  

Tips from GO Month Sponsor:

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Tips from GO Month Sponsor:

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Tips from GO Month Sponsor:

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There may be less than 10 days left of GO Month 2013, but our chapters are celebrating until the end!  Which GO Month events will you be attending this week?

January 22
What: Organizing With eCalendars
When:  2pm to 3 pm Eastern
Where: Webinar

January 23
Who: NAPO Richmond
What: Ask the Organizer Panel at the University of Richmond
When: 12:15pm to 1:15pm
Where: Jepson Hall, Room 118, University of Richmond, VA

January 25
Who: NAPO South Florida
What: GO Month Outreach: Starlight Foundation
When: 10am to 3pm
Where: 1350 East Sunrise Blvd, Suite 105, Fort Lauderdale, FL

January 25
What: Shred in the New Year!
When: Shredding from 12pm to 2pm
Presentation from 2pm to 3pm
Where: 6205 Mineral Point Road, Madison, WI

January 26
Who: NAPO Georgia
What: GO Month Workshop: Kitchen Organization Made Simple
When: between 9:30am and 10:30am
Where: 2753 E College Ave, Decatur, GA

January 26
Who: NAPO Austin
What: Clear Your Clutter Day
When: between 10am and 2pm
Where: Bethany United Methodist Church
10010 Anderson Mill Road, Austin, TX 78750

Planning ahead? Click here for a full calendar of GO Month events.

Have you ever heard the phrase “you don’t know what you’ve got ’till it’s gone?” Anyone who has ever pulled their hair out searching their computer for a document will know exactly what I am talking about.

There are few things more frustrating than looking for a file that you know must be somewhere on your hard drive, which is why I’ve come up with a few tips that will help you avoid this pain in the future:

Name your documents consistently.
Whether you are scanning documents in or downloading them off the web, take a moment to name them. Here are some tips:

• Include the date: You will find it much easier to locate documents if you include the date in important documents. I use the yyyy_mm_dd format.
• Think of your “future you”: You know what the file is now, but how about in a year? In two years? Think of what words you might use to look for that document in the future, and work them into the file-name.

Don’t over-think your folder structure.
Chances are, you have set up some folder structure for your documents. While you want to have a folder structure that means something to you, don’t go too in-depth with it. The more folders and sub-folders you create, the more you have to think about where you want to save a document and the more digging you need to do later. Create some high-level folders and trust that your naming structure and new search skills will save the day.

Make sure your documents are searchable.
PDF documents can have an “invisible text layer” inside the file. Why is this important? It allows your computer to read the text, and if your computer can read it, it can search it.

Most PDFs that you download from the web will already be searchable, but how about the ones that you scan? Check your scanner software’s settings and enable the option for Optical Character Recognition (OCR). It makes the scan a tiny bit slower, but it will make it much more likely that you will be able to find the document when you look for it in the future. Search And Ye Shall Find.

Now that you have made it much more likely that you will be able to find your documents, how do you go about doing that?

The familiar way is to go to your Documents folder and hunt through the files. Sometimes that works, but that assumes that you remember what it was called and where you put it.

Most modern operating systems will index and search documents on your computer. Just open Windows Search or Mac Spotlight and type in some words that you think will be in the file. Once you get the hang of doing this and learn some of the search tricks, finding files becomes extremely fast.

By putting in an extra bit of effort up front, you will be able to find the document you need when you need it.

Happy searching!

Today’s blog post was submitted by NAPO Member Brooks Duncan 

Brooks helps people go paperless at DocumentSnap.com where he writes about tools, workflows, and taking action. He’s a Certified Management Accountant and a former computer programmer and software support manager. Brooks lives in Vancouver, BC Canada.

I swear, the toys and clothes and books and random objects breed like rabbits when you aren’t looking. And don’t even get me started on the never ending influx of school papers, art work, birthday party goody bag junk and ‘treasures’. But luckily, if you’ve got good storage systems set up for everything, you can help keep things in order without tearing out your hair on a daily basis. While it’s great to have lots of storage, first you need to implement a few basic organizing strategies:

Sort and purge. This is a whole other post, but in essence, sort through everything and group like with like. Then discard (either donate/sell/trash) unwanted or outgrown items. What you have left is what you want to store – either for use by the child or to save.

Next, think about usage. How often does each item get used? Is it used by the child(ren) alone or with supervision? Is it an item that is being saved either as a memory or for them to grow into? The answers to these questions lets you know where to store each thing or group of things. For example, books the kids are currently reading should be easily accessible whereas books they have outgrown but were their favorites when they are little would be stored in a memory bin.  The more frequently an item is used, the closer it should be at hand.

So, with that in mind, let’s talk storage:

• Every kid needs a memory box where art work, report cards, notes, and other memories can be stored. It needs to be accessible to the parent but not necessarily to the child. When items are ready to be saved, you should be able to easily drop it into the box. One bin per kid. I like to stash these on an upper closet shelf with the lid off. When the bin is full, go through and discard anything you don’t want if you like, then label, store and start a new bin. The size of the bin will depend on how much you like to keep. Plan on one bin per year to start though you can edit down the bins as time goes on.
• Bins or baskets work really well for books rather than a bookshelf, especially for younger children. Find appropriately sized bins based on the size of the books and store them spine side up. Easy to grab, easy to replace and no more avalanches from a shelf. You can always store the bins on the bookshelf to keep them neat.
• Create stations or zones in kids rooms and playrooms for different activities. Corral small items in bags and bins, grouping like with like.
• Use pop up laundry hampers to corral stuffed animals.
• Use under bed bins for storing infrequently used items such as sleeping bags, extra linens, clothes to grow into, out of season clothing, etc.
• Buckets in varying sizes can be great for holding art supplies, craft projects, hair stuff, small toys, balls and more. Stash them on shelves for easy access.
• Use over the door clear shoe organizers to store groups of items. For example: Barbies, sun screens & insect repellants, hair accessories, craft supplies. If you have more than one group of items, be sure to group them row by row instead of scattered around.
• If you have school age children, use a portable file bin to store school papers you need or want to keep. You can use one per child, or use different colored hanging file folders for each. Create a tab for Reference (how to access the school website for grades, teacher info, schedules, etc.), Records (report cards, test scores, etc.), Activities (athletics, after school, classes, etc.), Medical (shot records, etc.), Work to Keep (school papers you’d like to hang onto). And any additional info you’d like to have at hand. The names of the files can be what you like as long as they trigger your memory for what the file holds. If you have a child with special needs, it is a good idea to create a separate portable file bin for holding medical and school records that you can take with you when meeting with teachers, therapists and doctors.

Tips:

• Stick with no more than 2-3 types of bins in no more than 2-3 colors. When the bins are in too many random styles and random sizes, it creates a cluttered feel even if the space isn’t.
• Use shelves with bins rather than drawers if possible. Bins can be removed so the items can be used, then put back where they belong.
• Label everything either with words or pictures or both! You can use a label maker, pre-printed labels or consider chalkboard or whiteboard paint on boxes or buckets.
• Do not group too many items together. It is better to have lots of small bins rather than just a few large ones. When a kid is looking for one particular art supply, it is much easier to simply grab the bin holding that group (markers, paper, crayons, etc) than dig through a huge box of craft materials.
• Create project boxes (I like using scrapbooking bins) for ongoing craft projects or kits. Keeps everything together while in use.
• Look for storage bins that stack easily.
• Ziploc bags or clear zippered pouches are great for corralling small items, especially arts & crafts and puzzle pieces. The bags can then be stored in bins. I like using the freezer bags as they are thicker and hold up better, and prefer the kinds with the ‘zipper’ style closure.
• Go vertical! Consider a loft bed with storage in the base; moulding or shelving near the top of the walls to display awards/treasures/art; or tall shelving units or armoires. Keep a step stool in the room to access these areas.
• Regularly purge their stuff. Stash special treasures in their memory bin and donate the rest. Only keep what they are currently using or will grow into.

Things to avoid:

• Large toy chests. These turn into a black hole of random items.
• Storage tools that are too specific and can’t be re-purposed to store other items.
• Storage items that are difficult to open and close.

The key to keeping organized with kids and storing kids stuff is to continually re-evaluate what they have and adjust storage as needed. Don’t store things just because…be purposeful about why you are storing anything. Is it a memory? Something to grow into? Out of season? Or just being stored because you didn’t feel like dealing with it?

Many of our NAPO Members have great Pinterest pages on organizing kids stuff. Here are just a few of my favorites…

NAPO National
Liz Jenkins of a fresh space
Deb Lee of D. Allison Lee
Bobbie Friedman of Simplified by Bobbie
Heidi Leonard of Operation Organization
Andi Willis of Good Life Organizing
Laurie Reeve of Simply In Order
Kimberly Davis of Simplified Space Solutions

Today’s blog post was submitted by Liz Jenkins, Certified Professional Organizer®, NAPO Marketing Committee, NAPO Conference Committee, Vice President of NAPO Nashville 

Liz specializes in residential and home organizing while living and promoting a green and simple life.  Her business, A Fresh Space, is based in Franklin, TN. 

Haven’t had a chance to attend a GO Month event?  Don’t worry, there’s still time!
Check out this week’s events and see what our members and chapters are up to in week three.

January 15
What: Plan to Organize
When:  6pm to 7pm CT
Where: 100 S. Water Street, Watertown, WI

January 15
Who: NAPO Pittsburgh
What: Ask the Organizer
When: 7pm to 8:30pm
Where: 100 Borough Park Drive, Pittsburgh, PA

January 19
Who: NAPO Charleston
What: GO Month Shred Blitz
When: 10am to noon
Where: 2500 Clements Ferry Road, Charleston, SC

January 19
Who: NAPO Georgia
What: GO Month Workshop: Tips for Preserving and Organizing Your Photos and Being a Photostoryteller
When: between 9:30am and 10:30am
Where: 2753 E. College Ave., Decatur GA

January 19
Who: NAPO Georgia
What: GO Month at IKEA: All Day Workshops
When: between 10am and 7pm
Where: IKEA in Atlantic Station
441 16th Street NW, Atlanta, GA

Planning ahead? Click here for a full calendar of GO Month events.

Does your house suffer from the “messies?” Is it so messy you can never find what you’re looking for?  Do you find yourself frequently running late for work because you can never find your car keys, purse or wallet?  If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, the following tips will help save time and keep you organized.

1. Keep items where you know you’ll see them. Drop your keys in a dish by the front door so you won’t waste time looking for them throughout the house.  Put anything you need to take with you by the front door- outgoing mail, your briefcase or the library books that need to be returned. I like to call this a launch station. Check your launch station each morning and you won’t be running through the house looking for what you need.

2. Put things back as you use them. Instead of leaving your paper on the coffee table go ahead and put it in the recycle bin or trash. Wash your dishes as you cook or put them in the dishwasher as you go. I like to put my groceries away as soon as I get home from the market. Spend 15 minutes a night putting things back that may have accumulated during the day, and you will wake up each morning to a clutter-free space.

3. Do only one project at a time. This is one of my favorite tips.  Instead of trying to multitask you just need to finish the project you are currently on before starting another one. This will keep you from becoming overwhelmed, procrastinating or worse…never finishing at all.

4. Focus on organizing one room each week. Instead of tackling the entire house at once try doing one room at a time until the whole house is in order. This concept also works with picking one area of your office space each week.

5. Have a donation station in your home. Pick a spot that you and your family members will use to put things that you no longer use, need or want that someone else may find useful. By having a place specifically for donations you are always reminded to purge.

Taking small steps every day will help keep your home and office organized and clutter-free. No more “messies” means you will get out the door faster each and every morning.

Looking for more ways to stay organized during GO Month?

• Follow NAPONatl on twitter for daily tips and tricks
• Check out NAPO’s Pinterest Page
• Visit the Professional Organizer Directory to connect with a NAPO Member in your area

Today’s blog post was submitted by Samantha Pointer, Director of Technology and Webmaster, NAPO Nashville Chapter 

Samantha  has been organizing the Nashville, TN and surrounding areas since 1997, and specializes in working with people with ADD, ADHD, hoarding issues and chronically disorganized individuals and families.  She is the owner of Get It Together! a professional organizing company specializing in residential and business organizing.  Samantha loves writing and sharing about all things organizing.

Tips from GO Month Sponsor:

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