5 Ways to Get on Top of the Paperwork

The Wall Street Journal did a survey a few years ago and found that the 'average' white collar worker spends 6 weeks a year looking for things around their office.

Do you have a huge challenge coping with the incoming paperwork? (Whatever happened to the paperless office?).

Paperwork lands on your desk (or enters you 'in-box') and somehow finds its way into your in-tray. Eventually the in-tray becomes so high it explodes and ends up all over your desktop. That's because you avoided taking action on those messy pieces of paper the moment they arrived. Now you have no option but to sort through the explosion and tidy up the pile or actually do something with the paperwork.

It's also frustrating when you need to search through the pile to look for information a client or one of your team has asked you about. Many times I've contacted people to follow them up and I can automatically picture their desktop as they search their in-tray for the information I've sent them.

How can a pile of paper cause you so much stress? If only you could organize the paper so that it would disappear! Looking at it is enough to raise anyone's blood pressure.

Here's 5 Ways to Get on Top of Your Paperwork

1. Purchase a large vertical wire step file (available from stationers)

2. Sort through your in-tray/s or piles and organize the paperwork into similar categories, i.e.

• Correspondence
• Reading
• Clients
• Invoices
• Staff

3. Label manila folders with the above categories.

4. Place folders into step file.

5. Organise direct debits for regular bills and keep your finger on the pulse when it comes to your money, bank accounts and finances.

Now you'll have all your work to do sitting in manageable files. It's much more effective than shuffling piles of paper.

This simple but practical device saves my accountant 2 hours per week. Do you know what that means to an accountant who charges out at $250 per hour?

Save Two Hours/Week @ Hourly Rate of $250

2 HRS/WEEK = $500
= 8 HRS/MTH = $2000
= 96 HRS/YR = $24,000

You don't need to be an accountant to understand the significance of saving a small amount of time and the impact it has overall. It's always the little things in life - the one percenters - which make the difference.

The Final Word

How many minutes, hours, days or months a year have you been wasting keeping yourself needlessly 'busy' with paperwork?

How much effort are you putting into making yourself 'busy' without realising there are much simpler, easier and faster ways of freeing up your time so you can get on with the business of making money?

Need some resources on how to increase your productivity and profits in 2009? Then get a copy of The Productivity and Profit Home Study System™. at www.productivityqueen.com/profit.html (why be time poor and struggle in your business, when you can easily get much more done, make more money and have time off?