The Guide to Keeping Your Desk Clear

How to reduce clutter on your desk

Looking for an Instagram-ready desk? Or just to keep things organized?

A clear clutter-free desk is very useful for taking control of your work day and empowering you to get things done. Despite recent research from the University of Minnesota suggesting messy desks are the sign of a “genius”, if you’re keen to keep things clean, then listen up!

We’ve put together a selection of tips for conquering your desk mess.

1. Cleaning Checklist

To get started, make a simple checklist, this list will allow you to map what needs to be cleaned and removed. Start with something like this;

• Remove any paper from the desk
• Add loose unused pencils and pens to the pot
• Re-organise your inbox area (station for items to-do)
• File older paper/reference away into folders
• Tidy away any non-work items (books, leaflets etc.)

Your goal is to get everything unnecessary off the desk to help utilise the most effective tools for the workday. This doesn’t mean comprising on a family photo or even a small friendly office buddy, but it means being ruthless on the other items.

2. Start of the Day

The start and end of your day are good points to do a routine clean. Start with the checklist and set aside 5–10mins at the start of the workdays to run over the checklist and clear your desk. This 5–10min dedication at the start of your day will help save you time, stress and any potential ongoing mess.

3. Invest in Units

You might want an IKEA-like set-up, or even a simple design like this as our desks, spending some time on your desk selection, if you have such an opportunity, will help you feel more comfortable.

Adding drawers, wall units, desk drawers and more will help you to begin organising your station.

4. Minimise Items

Not everything on our desk will be used on a daily basis. Grab 5 minutes to review the contents of your desk, if you see anything that might be aimless to your needs, ditch it, or stow it away for another time, when it becomes useful.

Minimising the need for resources will help declutter and free up space.

5. Use Storage Sites

Many people miss out on huge space with a simple trick. Using apps like Scanbot and Evernote to scan in documents and storing them on sites like Dropbox, Evernote or Google Drive can provide a nice way to save paper, reduce noise and keep yourself organized.

6. You have two desks

Yes, even the desktop on your PC/Mac is an area to keep clean. Whilst the big clean occurs, spend some time on clearing your desks. Remove older folders, file things into folders, minimise folder amounts, remove pinned apps you don’t use, delete unused media.

Getting this organized will improve your stress levels.

7. Introduce Trash

A suggestion from Craig at TM Ninja, introduce a trash can to your desk. This advice can prove handy when clearing your desk at the end of the day, but also for real-time management. Just putting completed paper in the bin and removing any “mess” as you go will help out massively!

We hope you enjoyed that collection of recommendations!

Like a clean, distraction-free experience? Try Newton.

Newton is one of the leading email apps on iOS, Mac, Android & Windows, providing users with a clutter-free, clean design for conquering emails. Combine this stunning design with features like Read Receipts, Undo Send and even Tidy Inbox to reduce clutter, you’ll be at Inbox Zero in no time.

Follow us on Medium for more articles.