Spring Cleaning

This is the time of year when we all “spring forward” onto the beach, hiking trails and gardening section at Lowes or Home Depot. After March 10, the sun will set around 8:30 p.m. in the Florida panhandle. I look forward to the days when I can jog after work in the daylight, reducing my chance of injury. I also look forward to the melatonin being postponed from engaging my sleep receptors at 6:30 p.m.

There is one more cliché to springtime – spring cleaning. Ah, the joys of organizing closets, cleaning out refrigerators and dusting behind wall art. If your outlook inbox and client folders look anything like mine, there is also much needed spring cleaning at the office.  Here are some quick tips to organizing and cleaning out your electronic office.

Inbox:

1.       Empty your deleted items folder.

2.       Sort through your inbox and delete the “reply all” emails you receive with the “thank you” response from every person copied.

3.       Create a “resourceful emails” folder for those emails with commonly used log-in information and other helpful information from colleagues. I utilize this folder at least once a week.

4.       Delete all the bounce back emails notifications you receive.

5.       Check your sent items folder. For all those emails in your inbox, there is likely a response stored in your sent items. Be sure to delete the unwanted response emails.

Network Folders:

1.       Delete multiple versions of files. We all have a first draft, then eventually a final. The more hands in the pot on a project, the more versions in between the first draft and the final. After significant time has pasted, there is rarely a reason to keep all versions except the final.

2.       Organize loose files and place them into folders. In the rush of working in an agency often times stray files will be saved in the correct client folder, but is not placed correctly in the subfolders.

Spring cleaning your inbox and client folders are not the most pleasant tasks, but you will feel lighter and more organized when you are done!