March 21st, 2008 - Simplifying at the office
Maybe next week, which is spring break for students and classes (but regular staff still work through it unless we take vacation days), I will clean up/clear out my office. It’s not that it’s in horrible shape (compared to some faculty offices I’ve been in!), but it’s getting far too cluttered for my tastes.
The most important question when working on simplifying your office is: What do I need to have in here to do my job?
Paper: As an academic, or at least, having come here straight from getting my PhD, I came with tens of pounds of copies of articles garnered from 4 years of grad school. For two years, they sat in a large filing cabinet (four drawers high, and really long). I never used them. So I weeded out everything that I hadn’t used in my dissertation, which was in the same field as I worked (online education). Another year or two later, after realizing I never looked at those articles either, I emptied the cabinet entirely–of course, the extra space had gotten filled up with other stuff I never used–and got it out of my office. I now I have one filing drawer in my desk. I mostly holds my daily/monthly folders (a la Getting Things Done), a selection of resources I have used in seminars or presentations, employment information (contracts, evaluations, etc.), and issues of Online Cl@ssroom (a newsletter I get–I should put them in a 3-ring binder on the shelves since I have so many now). When I finish my two courses this semester, I’ll also put folders of course material in the drawer–but only after I go through them to make sure I’m only keeping what I need.
I rarely keep paper copies of articles–I read online so why bother having them around the office? I don’t print out emails. I try not to print handouts for meetings sent electronically. If I feel I must do so, I recycle them as soon as I don’t need them (usually, right after the meeting). When a project or a task group or whatever is finished, I go through all the saved paperwork ASAP (sometimes that’s right away and sometimes, of course, it’s not for a while!). I almost always have papers in my recycling bin every single night.
Your mileage may vary on this, of course. I am not required to document what I do nor to keep notes or other materials for most things I work on. So I don’t. Materials from groups run by others–I figure they will keep copies. If I discover I really did need something I recycled, I just contact someone in the group and get another copy. In 8.5 years working here, this has rarely happened. Same goes for email/digital documents as well. I have zero interest in GMail which allows (even encourages) you to keep everything. I don’t want to keep everything!
Books: I checkout most of my books from the library, which is handily the building I work in. I have 5 books on my shelves (three of which I just loaned out this morning). I’m considering buy some more due to extra money I have to spend by July, but they are primarily used to give out to faculty and staff. I don’t need to refer to them but rarely. If I didn’t loan them out, I wouldn’t have any books up there. (I will probably get rid of one of them. I was asked to write a book review on it, but forget. I need to see if he still wants me to do so. If not, it’s gone. I didn’t find it useful and wouldn’t hand it out to most faculty/staff.)
I also have some 3-ring binders of materials. One will probably be gone next week when I clean up. I thought I’d use it as reference materials, but I never did. It’s been years since I went to that training seminar. Another is for search and screen committees, which I’m regularly on so I’ll keep that one. Another is about pinhole photography, written by my boss. It’s a neat book so I’ll keep it. The others–not sure what’s in them! Shouldn’t have things around when I don’t even know what they are! I also have a copy of the faculty/staff handbook which is 2-years out of date so I’m going to get up and recycle it right now. And one magazine: The peer-reviewed journal article Sean and I wrote is in it. (It’s the only one I’ve had published.)
Office supplies: How many sticky note pads do you really need? How many envelopes? Scrap paper? Printer cartridges? Are any of these things that could be stored elsewhere? In my case, yes, we have an office supplies area. I usually only have one or two extras in my office of things I use regularly.
Personal things: This is what’s mostly in my office. Of the 6 shelves on my bookcase, only two feet are taken up by work materials (the books plus a few computer-related things). The rest are pictures, crafts items, toys, my high school and college diplomas (grad school’s on the wall), and other odds n ends. And a Zen garden. My desk also has stuff like lotion, cocoa, tea, and books. I used to have another bookcase, but a coworker borrowed it in December and hasn’t returned it. I’ve decided I don’t need it back.
I hate cluttered areas. I love having a clean and clear office. And next week I will again.