Last week we spoke about decluttering all those f-r-e-e downloads (including mine!) and all the email. I always try to play along with you so I also decluttered some downloads (4 MP3 audios and 5 PDF e-books).

How did you do?

I must also apologise – I forgot to mention that as part of the Office Organising Bundle, you get Conquer your Email which will definitely help you if email’s your problem.

So how do you know if email’s a problem?

The quick answer is if you spend more than 30 minutes a day on email … but why don’t you take the assessment below this article.

90% of people waste an extra hour a day on email that they don’t have to. That hour translates to SIX WEEKS a year. You read that right – six weeks!

Now onto the rest of the computer decluttering.

Photos

Now that we’ve all gone digital, it’s so easy to snap, snap, snap and then snap some more.

Download pictures regularly, delete the bad ones there and then, and save the rest to CD or DVD regularly to fr.ee up some space on your computer.

I only print beautiful shots (because printing is so expensive here) so if I wouldn’t want to print it, I don’t keep it on my computer. If I want to use pics on the blog, I compress them immediately so that they take up 50KB as opposed to 1MB. And I name them meaningfully so I can find them afterwards with just a few clicks.

Blogs

How many blogs are you following in your Google Reader, Bloglines or other feed reader?

Do you know how long you take to read all of those blogs every day? Take some time to go through your feeds and declutter those you tend to skim over, especially if you do this 3 or more times every week.

Get to know your comfort number. Mine is around 42 – 45 and I know when I start adding more and more blogs without deleting any, I start feeling more and more overwhelmed at the sight of all those unread items!

My coaching challenge to you

1. Print out this post.
2. Tackle one of these sections every week until they’re all done.
3. Let me know when you do them.

Happy Organising.



Today I want to talk about an area of the office that may just be one of my favourite things to organise – your computer!

Because we can’t SEE computer clutter as obviously as we can see physical clutter, we often don’t realise it’s there but believe me, it’s still affecting you.

How does it affect you?

When you open your Inbox and feel drained at the sight of all your emails, when your computer runs slow because there are so many photos on there and when you click into your Google Reader and can’t BELIEVE how much some people post because you went through your blogs for 3 hours yesterday and now there are 127 unread items yet again!

Sound familiar?

Let’s look at 4 places where you can declutter electronically:

Free downloads

We (especially women) like fr.ee things, don’t we? Buy one, get one free sales come to mind… As a result, we download anything and everything we can find that’s for fr.ee.

If it’s fr.ee, it’s got to be good, right?

No, actually, it’s not all good. Not only are you cluttering up your computer but you can’t possibly use all the things that are out there because we live in an information-overload society.

I wish I could say that I”m immune to the addiction to FREE stuff but I’m not!

At one point I had about 6 different grocery shopping lists on my computer (all fr.ee downloads) and 10 different versions of a to-do list. None of them quite worked for me so I made my own.

Email

Mmmm, email. My clients need help with email more than any other thing in their office, and paper’s a close second. That’s because email’s so fast and because we don’t use it correctly.

Did you know that for every email you send out, you get at least two emails back?

Get familiar with the delete key (my favourite key on the keyboard) and start deleting. Delete immediately once you’ve replied to an email and don’t file unless you absolutely have to.

Disable all the notifications from social networking sites like Facebook. I only get friend requests, messages and notes on my wall in my inbox. The rest I’ll see when I get a chance to log on.

Here again, decide on your comfort level for emails and make sure you work your system until you can breathe again.

Personally, I set a daily goal of deleting at least 50 items so once I’m done with my inbox, I go through my Sent Items and delete, delete, delete

It’s this weird game I play – anybody have some other weird email games?

As a matter of interest, how many emails are in your inbox right now?

Look out next week for part 2 of decluttering your computer



I’m a big lover of “drag and drop”. I drag and drop almost anything and everything within Microsoft Outlook.

Here are 3 of my favourite ways to save you time:

2. saving email addresses

Drag and drop the entire email onto your Contacts. I like to do this the first time someone emails me (if there’s a need to keep the email, like with a new client) so I have all the background and not only the person’s email address.

It’s also easier (and faster!) for me than opening the email, right clicking the person’s name and then selecting “Add to Contacts”.

Today we’re decluttering photos.

Now that we’ve all gone digital, it’s become very easy to take hundreds of pics and not have to deal with the e-clutter.

Download your pictures regularly, delete the bad ones there and then, and save the good ones to CD or DVD regularly.

I only print really gorgeous shots (because printing is so expensive here in South Africa – in fact, when we travel, I like to print some overseas because it’s soooo much cheaper) so if I wouldn’t want to print it, I don’t keep it on my computer.

If I want to use pictures on the blog, I compress them immediately so that they take up 50KB as opposed to 1MB.

Here’s how to compress photos

• Open the picture in Microsoft Picture Manager (Start, Programs, Microsoft Office, Microsoft Office Tools, Microsoft Office Picture Manager).
• Click on Edit Pictures and then on compress.
• I usually compress to “web pages”
• Click OK

As easy as that, you’re done!

Knysna waterfront – May 2007

Organising your photos

Photos are one of those things that can quickly overwhelm you if you don’t have a system. Before you know it, you have thousands of photos on your computer and no idea where to start.

If this is you, make one folder titled Before _____ (today’s date) and start working backwards, just 15 minutes a day. Once you start, the momentum will easily carry you forward.

Then, from now onwards, do the following 6 steps and you’ll never be behind again.

1. Download after every major photo-taking session
It’s far easier to sort through 50 rather than 500 photos. However, if you take photos daily, you might want to do this once a week.

Read the other 5 steps here

Here are the schedule of challenges for the rest of March

13 – blogs and bookmarked links

20 - email

27 – documents & computer folders

Are you joining in with this week’s challenge?

Please encourage all your blog friends to join us in decluttering by using the button on your sidebar. Christmas is just around the corner and you need to start taking action so that you don’t just fill up all the spaces you’ve already decluttered.

The Declutter Tip for the week …

Communicate!

Communicate with your family and friends that you’ve chosen to live a simpler, decluttered lifestyle and if they really want to give you gifts, you’d prefer to receive consumable gifts instead of clutter.

Some of my favourite gifts are experiences - coffee and cake with a friend, massages, a wash and blow dry at the hairdresser, etc.

Start a wish list of books you REALLY want to read, etc.

This week, I decluttered about 20 bookmarked sites I’d been saving on my computer, about 5 documents and my usual 50 emails a day (at least).

Next week, I’ll declutter something a bit more tangible so I can post a picture. But you know what? I l-o-v-e a nice organised computer, don’t you?

What did you declutter this week?

Please link to the post on your blog where you show off your pictures or talk about the declutter. Or if you don’t have a blog, tell me in the comments about ANYTHING you got rid of this week.

It can be anything like physical, electronic, mental clutter or even the need to be a certain way. Like perfectionism!

Just thought I’d let you know I’m guest posting over at the Organizing Junkie…

and the topic is… Organising your computer

Have a read and let me know what you think.

I have two gmail accounts – don’t ask, it’s a long story – and what I’ve been doing is using the one as my main Google Reader account and the other for some blogs I wanted to keep track of, but they don’t post regularly so those posts can pile up.

I’ve been subscribing like crazy to both my Google Reader accounts so they’re getting out of hand and it’s not uncommon for me to find 81 items unread, which is unusual for me.

Account 1
Started with 42 feeds
Removed 7 but added 2
Left with 37

Account 2
Started with 19 feeds
Removed 10
Left with 9

Total: left with 46 blogs in total

That’s not too bad because my comfort level is around 42

How many blogs do you read?

Today’s organising challenge
Declutter some blogs you’re just not getting around to and tell me how many in the comments

I received an email about a really interesting and very common problem so I thought I’d post.

Hi Marcia…

Do you have or know of an article about how to get rid of files that – not mainly waste space but – waste time and energy, because they clutter up your mind? I tend to archive and save lots of files and interesting things and end up not knowing what I have, checking files regularly to see whether they are still interesting. I don’t throw them away, because I think they might be of interest eventually. I’d be interested in any ideas and articles about that. – - David

I certainly relate and I know a lot of you do too. We surf websites, download stuff, free ebooks, reports, articles and keep them all on our computer (or printed and stuck in a file somewhere) for the elusive ONE DAY!

Here’s what I wrote to David…

1) getting through my ebooks
2) cleaning out my computer
3) learning what I intended when I first downloaded the files

I have a whole ebook dedicated to offices, papers and computers called 7 easy steps to organise your office which you can read more about at http://takechargesolutions.org/oyo.html. Otherwise, I send out a weekly tips ezine which you might also be interested in – go to http://www.organiseyourbusiness.com/ to sign up.

Hope that helped you!

Or how I organise my blogging.

Reading blogs

1. I use Google reader. It is sooo easy to add blogs and since I sorted out my blogger problem, I am happy as a clam. This tip alone has saved me hours every week, hours I don’t have to go to each bookmarked blog to check if they’ve updated.

2. If I come across blogs I’m not sure I want to add to Google reader yet but I do find them interesting enough to explore, I have a word document called… wait for this…Blogs to read. I copy the URL and paste it in there. Then when I have some extra computer time, or while waiting for pages to download, I keep the document open and I can quickly have a browse. If the blog is something I enjoy and want to continue reading, I can then easily add the URL to google reader.

3. I also try and declutter my blogs on a monthly basis. I say try because it is very hard to eliminate blogs. However, facts are facts and sometimes they don’t serve you any longer. There were a lot of blogs I read regularly when I first started out that I just don’t enjoy now for various reasons – some are too crude, some are too negative (let me just quickly explain – I have no problems with being real, but too much negativity gets me down). So I’m not hard and fast like I am with my computer files and folders (but that’s another post) but I do have a scroll through and think about it.

Writing blog posts
I have many, many blogs. This one, the Take Charge one, a family one, the newsletter archives, and a secret one.

Someone called me an overachiever in my comments once because of all the blogs but it’s just that I really like sorting things out, hence (!) one for organising, one for travel, and so on.

1. I have another Word document called blogging for the week. This is where I plan most of my posts for the week ahead. When you start this – if you start this – you’ll be one week behind but after that it’s easy.

2. I have a page for each of the things I participate in on a weekly basis, like Menu Plan Monday, Tackle it Tuesday and WFMW. And I keep a basic format which I add to during the week. If I think of a recipe I want to put on the menu next week, I add it to my document so I don’t forget.

3. I also have a page for each blog. And I type the blog’s name in huge letters like this at the top of the page so I don’t have to strain my eyes. If I find a quote I like or I think about something I want to blog, I add my notes on the relevant page.

4. Now on my flash drive I have a folder called Blogging, and inside of this I have subfolders for each of my blogs. As I take pictures and compress them, I save them in their individual blog folders so it’s easy when I’m composing a blog post.

5. For the memes, I write those out on the weekend beforehand and post to my drafts. Funnily enough, except this particular post. This one’s fresh because I chose to rather go watch Music and Lyrics with my husband on Sunday night (my regular planning for the week time). Now I’ve just thought I should blog that so I’m going to open my document and add it under Take Charge blog.

6. Now another tip if you have a mailing list and you send out regular mailings…convert your blog posts to newsletter articles. I’m going to jazz this one up and submit to one of the article directories!

Commenting on blog posts
1. I must be honest here. Since Google reader, if I can only see two lines of a feed, I won’t go to the blog to read the entire post if I don’t have time. Unless it really grabs me, of course. So the blogs with their entire feeds always get read! Just in case you were wondering. So if I absolutely must comment, I’ll click through to the post and leave my comment.

2. This is a big important tip for me – I always try to remember (again I say try because sometimes I’m in a big hurry and I forget) to copy my comment before clicking submit (or whatever the button is on the various platforms). The times I don’t remember there is a problem and I lose my comment. I must also mention that I have a really hard time commenting on Typepad blogs. They don’t seem to like me and 99% of the time don’t accept my comments. Blogger and WordPress are much friendlier. So if you’ve wondered, that’s the reason. Anyway, if the thing gives you an error, you can reload the page and comment again without typing it all up again. Who has the time?! And do the same before you hit publish. I have been known to lost posts too!

3. I LOVE it when people have ticked the box on their blogger profile. Go to your dashboard, click on edit profile, and tick the box that says show email address. It means I can reply to you and say hello and thanks for visiting. Please please please do this.

Again, if you leave a loooong comment, you could turn it into a blog post. It’s called blogging smarter

Well, thanks for reading!

I hope this helps at least someone out in the blogosphere today. And if you have some blogging tips for me, please leave a comment. I would love to streamline even more!

Now I just have to figure out a way to minimise my computer time. So far I get on the computer about 3 evenings a week. I do then tend to stay on for quite a while but I figure at least I have 2 evenings free. I also try to schedule a deadline like quickly get on for an hour before a TV show. That doesn’t always work because the computer is far more appealing to me than TV.

For more great tips, go visit Shannon over at Rocks in my Dryer.

Outlook… Not Just for Email! Using Your Outlook Calendar
By: Janet Barclay, MVA

Microsoft Outlook is one of the most widely used software programs for email, but if you’re only using it for email, you’re missing out on a great productivity tool! Here are a few ways you can use the Outlook calendar to make scheduling easier.

Add public holidays to your calendar automatically.

On the Tools menu, click Options, and then click Calendar Options.
Under Calendar Options, click Add Holidays. Select the check box next to each country/region whose holidays you want to add to your Calendar, and then click OK. Your own country/region is automatically selected.

Color code your appointments.

When you select a label for each appointment, Outlook will assign it a color, drawing attention to your most important activities and allowing you to see at a glance how you are spending your time. The default labels are as follows, but they can be customized to meet your needs.

Important – Red
Business – Blue
Personal – Light Green
Vacation – Gray
Must Attend – Orange
Travel Required – Aqua
Needs Preparation – Olive Green
Birthday – Purple
Anniversary – Dark Green
Phone Call – Yellow
None – White

Unfortunately, this feature is not available in earlier versions of Outlook.

Turn a message into an appointment or task.

What’s the quickest way to deal with an email inviting you to a meeting or event?

Drag the message onto your Calendar and a new appointment will be created. The entire message will appear in the details section – all you need to do is edit the subject line, location, date and time! Send an RSVP if necessary, and now you can delete the email!

Not sure if you’re going to attend? Set Show time as to Tentative and the appointment will display with a dashed border rather than a solid one. In this case you should also drag the message onto your Task Pad and a new task will be created. Edit the subject line to be a reminder to register for the event, and set the due date early enough that you won’t miss out if you decide to go.

Print pages for your paper planner.

If you like the idea of using the Outlook calendar, but are more comfortable using a paper planner, Outlook allows you to print pages in daily, weekly or monthly layouts, formatted to fit a variety of commercial planners. Print the whole year, or just today’s schedule!

It’s not just about work.

There are many websites that allow you to download schedules right into your Outlook calendar, including sports teams and TV stations, among many others. You’ll never have to miss your favorite team or show, and just think of the time you’ll save!

About the Author
Janet Barclay, Organized Assistant, offers a variety of professional quality services to support entrepreneurs and other individuals who are overwhelmed by the demands and technology of the 21st century. For further information or to request a subscription to her monthly ezine, The Organized Assistant Resource, please visit her website at www.organizedassistant.com.
Article Source: OrganizedArticles.com