Staying organized while running a business is an absolute must. With so many balls in the air it doesn’t take long to feel overwhelmed and out of control. You might be caught doing the next thing in front of you, just to try and stay afloat.
I’m sure you know what I mean because you’ve found yourself in a similar situation or are currently feeling overwhelmed. Handling the email, piece of paper, person, or idea that is right there in front of you, until the next urgent and time-sensitive task comes up. This repeats over and over until you have no idea what you are doing or why you are even doing it.
This is a risky behavior for a business owner to get trapped in.
It means you are never really in control of your business. If you’re only able to react to what’s in front of you, you’re not able to move in any kind of strategic direction.
When I start to feel this way in my life and in my business, I know it’s time for me to make a shift, a sort of reset. You can’t grow your business or even stay afloat if you can’t keep your focus.
Taking some time to organize your business will actually save you time in the long run. No more will you waste time trying to figure out which task to work on next. No more searching through piles of loose notes. You will be heading in the right direction, by implementing just a few of the items from the list below.
Here are 9 tips for getting organized in your business.
1. Clear and Organize Your Workspace. A first important step to regaining your focus is to take everything off your desk. Make sure to clean the surface!
Put back only the things you need or use every day. Remember that every single thing on your desk is taking up some of your attention, whether you realize it or not. Be picky about what lives in your workspace.
Your desktop is a place to be creative, solve problems, and make money. Make sure there is enough space to do just that.
2. Organize the work. So, with the remaining paper and items that didn’t find a place on your desk, start by sorting them into piles based on things to file, recycle, that need follow up, or a dedicated spot, etc. You can even create and label folders with the items that need follow up.
3. Use a Planner (Paper or Electronic). This may seem obvious, but it’s too important to not have on my list! I utilize both a paper planner and the calendar app on my phone to help me keep track of my important appointments and commitments.
If you would rather keep your appointments, meetings, electronically, Google Calendar is great for tracking these things.
4. Using Tasks to Prioritize Your Day. Having a to-do list is a must when getting and staying organized. Checking something off your list after it has been completed is a great feeling too!
I use Asana to help me stay on track and it’s free! You can easily create a task, by giving your task a name, provide additional details about it, set a due date and even set it to re-occur (daily, weekly, monthly, annually). You can create templates to use when repeating the same set of tasks, e.g., client onboarding, webinars, and events.
Interested in learning more about Asana? Check out – Asana: Task Management Software for your Small Business.
5. Use Evernote. Do you have hundreds of notes saved in your phone, in notebooks and on post-its that are difficult to find? Then you need Evernote! Copy and paste your notes into categories that are easy to find. Evernote is easy to use and allows you to organize your notes in a way that makes sense to you.
6. Track Income and Expenses. It’s important to know how much you’re spending versus making. How do you know if your business is profitable if you don’t have an organized way to track your income and expenses?
Need a simple way to track your expenses, you can keep an Excel spreadsheet, or use software like Quickbooks, Freshbooks, or Waveapps. You can either purchase as software or online and they connect to your bank accounts.
7. Declutter Your Digital Space. Your digital space can become cluttered just like your physical workspace. Keep your digital space organized by creating dedicated folders on your computer’s hard-drive, then moving documents into each of the folders. E.g., a folder for each of your clients, with subfolders for images, logos, presentations, webinars, etc. Delete and/or move files until your digital space is easy to navigate. It will be much easier to find what you need.
8. Organize Your Email. Have you ever heard of the term inbox zero? The goal of inbox zero is keeping your inbox empty — or nearly empty — at all times. Does this sound like an impossible dream? There is a way to manage your inbox so that it might not be zero but what if you could have all of your messages read, and anything completed or no longer requiring your attention could be filed away in subfolders to be easily searched for at a later date?
Similar to the process above of decluttering your digital space and workspace you file your emails that no longer require action into specific subfolders. Keeping only emails that need follow up in your inbox. Also, if you receive emails that are no longer relevant, make sure to unsubscribe!
To learn more about organizing your email inbox, check out my post – 5 Easy Steps To Get Your Email Organized.
9. Set Aside Time Each Month to Brainstorm. This may not fit for every business, but if you ever find yourself feeling distracted or struggling to come up with new ideas, brainstorming helps to regain your focus. Set some time aside each month to brainstorm. This can be either about blog posts, social media posts, or new products or ideas.
Once you are able to focus and put new ideas to paper, you are set up to create goals and to-do lists for the upcoming month.
Perhaps the hardest part is dedicating blocks of time to work on organizing your business and then keeping it organized. You may not have time to tackle these projects from beginning to end but if you set a little bit of time aside each day or week, you will notice a difference in your ability to find things more easily and to complete tasks more quickly.
But I guarantee that if you stop reacting to everything that’s coming at you and take some time to organize your office, your projects, your thoughts, and your time, you’ll get more done more easily than you ever thought possible.