'52 Pickup' For Organization And Productivity

1. Stop what you're doing and take time to get organized. Create a place for everything and then put everything in its place. That extra stuff on your desk can be distracting.
2. Take time at the end of the day to put things away and plan the two or three key goals you'll need to accomplish the next day.
3. Plan segments of your day to process mail, make outgoing telephone calls, accept visitors, and participate in meetings.
4. Read The One-Minute Manager by Ken Blanchard.
5. Highlight or circle telephone numbers you use in the public telephone book. The next time you call, you won't have to waste much time looking. If you call a number three times, add it to your personal contact list.
6. Update your personal contact list every three months. Cross-reference listings to related projects and people.
7. Program the speed-dial feature on your telephone for your most frequently called numbers. Create a master page (or two) of additional numbers you access regularly. Laminate the page or keep it in a clear plastic pocket to reduce the need to recopy it.
8. Invest in a headset for your telephone to free your hands for the keyboard and files.
9. Consider getting an answering machine and/or voice mail system. It will allow you to set aside uninterrupted time to complete more difficult service transactions.
10. Use a system for filing regular paperwork. Color-coded, alphabetical, or numerical files can help determine priorities.
11. Batch similar tasks. Then work on one given batch at a time.
12. Don't put it down, put it away!
13. Put excess reading material into your briefcase to take home, or pass it to someone else with a request to return it.
14. Use vertical file racks to eliminate piles of files.
15. Clearly label your disks.
16. Use only two baskets or trays. Label one 'incoming' and one 'outgoing.' Three or more baskets only give you more places to accumulate (and lose!) paper.
17. Prepare a secondary area near your work surface to hold such items as your calculator, telephone, and stapler.
18. Do what you are paid to do first.
19. When you receive a trade publication, scan the table of contents, copy articles important to your goals, and pass along the magazine.
20. Understand and accept your 'body clock.' Tackle the toughest jobs when you're at your peak.
21. At the beginning of each calendar quarter, clean out your desk drawers and keep only the supplies you use often.
22. Create a supply control. Put a brightly colored flag in each supply box, shelf, etc. The flag should say 'GIVE THIS TO [person responsible for inventory control] FOR REORDER OF [type of supply running low].'
23. Create an agenda to help you accomplish specific daily, weekly, and monthly objectives.
24. Use a calendar or master system to follow up on issues requiring action by someone else.
25. Write down your goals, identifying what you want, why you want it, and how you're going to get it. Keep these goals in plain sight.
26. Treat files not simply as holding areas for paper but as tools for managing client information.
27. Clearly identify paper and manual files with the name of the enclosed client or project.
28. Do the same with automated files.
29. Clearly label file drawers. You'll save time searching.
30. Think BIG. Create poster-size wall charts for anything: a master plan for your year, for a project, for goal attainment. It helps to see your goal(s) regularly.
31. Whenever you type something more than twice, create a form (or format) for duplicating or customizing for late use.
32. Be decisive. Playing Scarlet ('Tomorrow is another day') O'Hara only adds to your work load.
33. Educate and delegate. Teach another person about your work; perhaps he or she will love it enough to want to do it for you!
34. Schedule some time for action, some time for planning and thinking, and some time for feeling good about yourself and others (being a team player and socializing).
35. Free space in cabinets and drawers. Files, supplies, and whatever else you like to keep handy will be more accessible if they're less jammed in.
36. Listen to learn. Active listening helps you stay organized and productive.
37. Use checklists to be sure you cover all important items.
38. Establish a productive pace for yourself; too fast can be as bad as too slow.
39. Categorize your work into (1) major, (2) minor, (3) time- or date-sensitive and (4) not pressing. Do the major and time-sensitive work first.
40. Calculate the monetary value of every minute you invest at work. Once you see your time in terms of money, you'll be less apt to waste it.
41. Avoid making telephone calls just before lunch time or the end of the day-unless you know you'll reach the person you need to speak with!
42. Live according to Murphy's Law: 'Whatever can go wrong, will . . . and at the worst possible moment.'
43. Prepare to participate in meetings. Ask for an advance agenda-or even better, offer to prepare it. Gather information you'll need for the discussion.
44. Complete information in the format required by the next person who will work on your account.
45. Create a left-to-right flow for paper. Place incoming work to your left; place completed, ready-to-mail items to the right.
46. Create a master page of activity file codes, producer and subproducer codes, and company codes for a handy reference.
47. Be faithful to filing. A few minutes filing documentation each day will keep necessary information in its place and eliminate future needs for a major overhaul.
48. Identify your activities as accessible (during which you're open to the telephone, producers, clients and co-workers) and personal (during which you should not be disturbed).
49. Master one new application of your software technology every week.
50. Prepare new business folders for producers. Before they call on new prospects, give them a new business folder containing blank forms for submissions and a checklist of additional items you'll want to provide the best service possible.
51. Use a renewal control. Get ahead of the renewal process by creating a planned approach for renewing an account BEFORE it's time to communicate with the carriers about upgrades or changes in coverage.
52. Pre-address envelopes to those you mail to most often. (A personal note: I send lots of birthday and anniversary cards. I try to buy them at the beginning of each month for the whole month. I then pre-address the envelopes, indicate the date they are to be mailed where the stamp will be placed, and stack them in date order.)

These techniques will help you become more organized and productive. You can count on it!