Maintaining Digital Organization While Reducing Physical Clutter

this entry has 0 Comments/ in File Management, Individual Productivity / by Innovatively Organized

August 31, 2012

For the past month, we have discussed ways to reduce digital clutter across your various devices – organizing apps on your phone, clearing desktop clutter, filing electronic documents, and syncing mobile devices. Beyond routine maintenance of your digital clutter to keep it at a minimum, it is important to keep in mind that your physical clutter, and especially paper piles, relate to electronic organization.

If you are hoping to go paperless and reduce piles of paper, one of our favorite product lines is the portable scanners made by ScanSnap. Scanners are a great tool to scan your paper documents, including business cards, forms, and receipts, turning your physical clutter into organized electronic files. If you want to know more, check out this article where Elizabeth Bowman has 5 tips for using a ScanSnap scanner to maintain a clean work surface.

Innovatively Organized takes a unique approach to helping individuals streamline their productivity. We spend time getting to know our clients in order to understand personality preferences, learning styles, and organizational goals, which allows us to define and implement optimal solutions for maximum operational efficiency.

5 Reasons Why Syncing Mobile Devices is Important

this entry has 0 Comments/ in Individual Productivity, Time Management / by Innovatively Organized

August 30, 2012

Keeping your mobile devices in sync is one of the best ways to help yourself stay productive when on-the-go! If you use multiple devices – a laptop, a desktop, a smartphone, a tablet – it’s important to set up your accounts and tools to sync across all of them. For example, if you use a virtual notebook, make sure your account is logged in on each of your devices and is set up to automatically sync. By syncing across devices, you can…

Reduce digital clutter and minimize saving duplicate copies on portable drives
Stay productive on-the-go anywhere in the world
Travel light and avoid packing multiple notebooks or paper files
Collaborate as a mobile worker and keep up-to-date with team members on project status easily
Save time having to catch up at the end of the day because you’ve been “in the loop” all along

For example, here are a few types of accounts that should be synced across devices:

Virtual notebooks
Calendars
Email accounts
To Do List apps

5 Benefits of Consistent File Naming

this entry has 0 Comments/ in File Management, Process Improvement / by Innovatively Organized

August 29, 2012

Ever tried finding a document, photo, presentation, or file on your computer…and after exhausting every possible location, come up short? You were positive that you saved it, but you just can’t find it?

It all comes down to how you named your file. If you named your download, image, or document something difficult to remember or reference, the odds of you finding it again are slim. It’s important to name files consistently, in a manner that makes sense to you (and the people that may also need to access and find locate a file).

Here is a list of 5 benefits of using consistent files names for yourself or your whole team:

Save valuable time spent looking for your files and actually find what you need, when you need it
Manage version control of files by having a consistent numbering system for updated documents
Reduce digital clutter when storing electronic files in a clearing labeled way
Collaborate and share files with team members easily
Avoid having to start over or replace lost files when you can’t find one

What are your tips? Share your thoughts and leave us a comment.

How to Work Collaboratively with Microsoft SkyDrive

this entry has 0 Comments/ in Individual Productivity, Process Improvement / by Innovatively Organized

August 28, 2012

Working collaboratively with your team or backing up your own personal files is easy when using a filing sharing cloud solution such as Microsoft SkyDrive. The beauty of using a cloud service like SkyDrive is that it allows you to stay productive wherever you are, with any of your mobile devices.  Recently there have been announcements of exciting changes with Microsoft solutions, and SkyDrive is included among the many enhancements. SkyDrive is a versatile option available for Windows, Mac, iPad, and mobile devices. Whether you are creating, editing, or sharing documents you can use SkyDrive with web apps for Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote. You’ll be able to use it at work to stay productive on-the-go or working collaboratively with your team. SkyDrive also has the flexibility to manage your personal documents, family files, to-do list, and photos.   Storing your files and documents in SkyDrive allows you to access them from any computer or mobile device. It includes Office web apps so you can create documents. And you can share any file you like with your colleagues, friends, or family. Sidenote: If you live in the Seattle area, attend our in-person “Organized Executive” series at the Microsoft Store in the University Village to learn how to use OneNote within SkyDrive.

Shared Contacts Get Cleaned Up

this entry has 0 Comments/ in Contact Management, Process Improvement / by Innovatively Organized

August 27, 2012

Scroll through your phone for a moment and look at how many contacts you have stored. Now consider how many contacts a small company may need to stay on top of regularly. A company recently came to us for help tackling just this - their overwhelming contact lists.

Although contacts were stored within a single tool such as Microsoft Outlook, the team members knew they needed to be reviewed and cleaned up. The team shared several contact lists and some contacts had duplicate entries while others were missing information. Since they are busy mobile workers it was necessary to organize the contacts so the team is no longer slowed down by searching for data.

To tackle the contact clean-up project, we, the productivity consultants from Innovatively Organized, found and removed duplicate contacts and then flagged contacts with missing information. Next, the team reviewed the flagged contacts and tried to fill the gaps of missing information by gathering the most up-to-date information for contacts possible. We then recommended a process of inputting future contacts to reduce the chance of duplicates being created.

The shared contact lists are now much more reliable for the company’s team members, with up-to-date information and duplicate contacts removed.

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Can you relate to this? What is your biggest contact organizing challenge? Leave a comment and let us know!

Innovatively Organized is a Seattle-based productivity consulting firm providing digital clutter clean-up and process improvement services to small businesses and over-extended executives. Call us for a free 15-minute phone consultation.

Family Back-to-School Checklist

this entry has 0 Comments/ in General Organizing, Residential Organizing / by Innovatively Organized

August 24, 2012

It’s time to get the kids ready for the classroom! It can be a time consuming process for busy parents, making sure everything is purchased and schedules are coordinated. To help with your time management and planning (and to ensure it’s not as stressful this year as in the past), we want to share our new Family Back-to-School checklist. It has everything you and your kids need to do in preparation for the school year, so you won’t forget anything or run out of time.What are your least favorite back-to-school tasks?

Most Workers Don’t Get Stress Relief from Vacation

this entry has 0 Comments/ in Individual Productivity, Time Management / by Innovatively Organized

August 23, 2012

More than 58% of workers report “they receive no stress relief from their vacations,” according to a recent study by the Puget Sound Business Journal - “Most workers get no stress relief from vacation, survey finds.”

In fact, more than 27% feel “more stressed after their vacations than before they took the time off.”

We were shocked to hear that lying on a beach somewhere is not relaxing to most professionals. However, as productivity consultants, we understand and see it all too often, just how difficult it is to put everything on hold, to ignore the incoming emails, and to leave the office behind. Before you start canceling your upcoming flights and trip plans, there’s hope! Not only is it possible to take time off from work to relax, but perhaps you could take a month-long vacation from work. That might sound impossible, but the key is in properly preparing yourself and your office for your absence. We recently interviewed Innovatively Organized president, Elizabeth Bowman, for her tips on preparing to leave work for a trip. To help you make productive use of your time leading up to a trip, take a quick peak at our checklist to help you prepare for a flight or our list of tasks that you can complete while in-flight. It is possible to take time off of work to de-stress and relax. Contact us for a 15-minute phone consultation if you would like to learn more about improving your productivity.

Tips for Organizing Your Bookmarks

this entry has 0 Comments/ in Individual Productivity / by Innovatively Organized

August 22, 2012

Every time I start browsing the web for research, I typically end up visiting numerous sites that I don’t have time to review fully at the time but will want to come back to in the future. With a long list of favorite websites to visit, it can be challenging to keep track of them. Whether you need to keep track of your favorite blogs to read, or you have several important sites that you reference at work, organizing your bookmarks can be tedious.

Here is one idea to help you organize your web browser bookmarks, especially for visual people. Don’t forget to routinely clear out your bookmarks too. Most likely there may be websites that you no longer need to visit. How many bookmarks do you have? Share your tips or ask questions in the comments below!

Virtual Keyboards for Working Anywhere

this entry has 0 Comments/ in Individual Productivity / by Innovatively Organized

August 21, 2012

We are fascinated by this cool new product – virtual keyboards so you can work anywhere! The laser projection keyboard is projected onto any flat surface, allowing you to type and work with the same efficiency and speed as you would with a full keyboard. Not only does it work with your smartphone, tablet, and laptop, but it is built into a compact keychain for easy portability.

You’ll love it for:

Working on the go with your tablet or smartphone
Needing to bring less items with you
Packing less on trips

Cost: $99.99

Available at: Brookstone

Virtual Notebooks Help Reduce Digital Clutter

this entry has 0 Comments/ in Individual Productivity, Time Management / by Innovatively Organized

August 20, 2012

One of our favorite digital tools to reduce digital clutter and go paperless is a virtual notebook. In particular, we currently are enjoying feature-rich products such as Microsoft OneNote and Evernote. Not only do they sync with multiple devices so you can stay productive on-the-go, but they help organize digital notes, files, and information. Think of a virtual notebook exactly as it sounds – a notebook for you to jot down ideas, record important information, and reference for your notes – except there is no paper involved. Using a virtual notebook like OneNote or Evernote means your notes are compiled, rather than scattered among several documents, files, and folders. Since both of these tools sync to numerous types of devices, it is possible to reduce the need to send documents as email attachments. To collaborate, simply share parts of your notebooks with your family, friends, or co-workers to save time.

Here are just a few examples of ways to use a virtual notebook (these examples are based on using a tool such as Evernote, but can apply to Microsoft’s OneNote as well):

To learn how to use Microsoft OneNote, come join us at our next Seattle-based training session! As part of “The Organized Executive” training series held each month at the Microsoft Store you will learn how to get started with OneNote, use it for task management, and keep it in sync across multiple devices.