Is Your Desk a Candidate for Detox?

Take a moment and look at your desktop. Is it edge-to-edge paperwork? Are your files in piles so high, people looking into your office would mistakenly think you’re not in? Do your co-workers roll their eyes when they hear you say, “I know it’s here someplace.”?
Or worse, are people in the habit of making a copy of the documents they give you, knowing you may not be able to locate your copy when it’s time to act upon it?

With the increasing demands of our work lives, even the most organized person can easily spin out of control, become buried beneath piles of “To Do’s” and filing.

For years I have listened to clients’ exclamations of knowing what’s in every pile. Of being able to put their hands on any document needed. In reality, I have yet to meet the person who can back that claim.

The paper shuffle has become so endemic that a new term has been coined for it, “infonoia.” “Infonoia” is the fear of being caught without an important document at the time it’s needed. It is, in short, paranoia of lack of information.

Especially today, with the reach and depth of computers, most any document can be recreated on the rare occasion that you can’t produce it when needed. More realistically speaking, the only real value of information is measured in your ability to put your hands on it when it’s called for. In other words, stacks and reams of paper are worthless – aka have no value – …