A clear desk means a clear mind. When you can rid your workstation of clutter, it’s much easier to focus on your work without any visual distractions. When your desk is properly organised you can work much more efficiently, with everything you need to hand and easy to find in its right place.

When you’re working it can be difficult to keep your desk neat and organised. You might find that you constantly have paperwork strewn over your desk, or you can’t find the tool you need because it’s got lost in the mess. However, with our below organising tips and desk tidy ideas, you can get your workstation organised and keep your desk free of clutter.

Utilise Wall Space

Rather than cluttering your desk with tools and equipment, you should utilise the wall space around your desk. Use a whiteboard to note your to-do list for the day, draw out your monthly schedule and jot down important reminders. Our magnetic glass whiteboard has a minimalist design and is available in three Cosy colours, so you can keep your workspace organised and stylish. The tempered safety glass is ultra-erasable and highly resistant to ink stains, scratches, and dents, so it will stay looking clean and fresh, adding to your un-cluttered workspace. The magnetic surface can also be used to keep notes and photographs, freeing up space on your desk.

Wall space around your desk could also be used for filing and office storage. Using shelves rather than your desk will mean you can keep your workstation clear of anything that isn’t essential. As soon as you’re done with a document, make sure to file it according to a system that makes sense to you, rather than letting it sit on your desk causing clutter. You could also colour-code your lever arch files to make it easier to find what you need, for example, using a yellow folder for invoices, a blue folder for reports, and a black folder for correspondence. Clearly mark your files with spine labels to make your filing system even more efficient.

 

 

Storage boxes should be used to store the equipment that you don’t use all day, but you still want close to hand. Boxes or a drawer cabinet will keep your items tidy and organised without them looking cluttered and causing a distraction when you’re focusing on work.

Maximise the Space Under Your Desk

Make sure you’re using every inch of space available by getting drawers to fit in under your desk space. You should ensure there’s still plenty of room for you to fit comfortably, but the right size drawers can help you to clear space on your desk and keep everything tidy. You can keep your drawers organised with an organiser tray that has sections to keep your tools tidy. Our organiser tray has a handle so you can take it out when you need ongoing access to your equipment and it can also be paired with our storage box for an optimal modular storage solution.

Under-desk drawers can also be used for suspension filing, giving you easy access to documents whilst also keeping them organised. Our suspension files have built-in label holders, so you can easily find the documents you need and organise them to your own filing system.

 

 

Use Letter Trays to Organise Paperwork

If you often work with paper documents, you could find that your desk quickly becomes cluttered with paperwork. Letter trays are a simple way of organising your documents. Stacking your trays will give you multiple sections to sort your paperwork, so you can have a section of items that need to be dealt with, items that are in hand, and items that require an extra task. Our Cosy Letter Trays are also available with an attached desk organiser, giving you more desk storage to organise your tools, without taking up desk space.

If you have different sizes of documents or envelopes that need sorting, our tray divider can be used to create different compartments into a single letter tray. This gives you more versatility, so you can create the best desk organising unit for your tasks and workflow. 

Put Your Most-Used Tools Near Your Dominant Hand

To work most efficiently and also maintain a good ergonomic desk setup, you should keep your most used tools near your dominant hand. For example, if you’re right-handed and you use the phone a lot throughout the day, you should ensure it’s to the right of your computer. This will make it easy to access and prevent you from having to stretch awkwardly across the desk. Similarly, if you have to write a lot and you’re left-handed, keep your pen pot to the left side of your desk.

Think about what you use most often and where it should sit for ease of access. This will help you to work more efficiently and also keep your desk organised, as you’ll be less likely to move items around because they’re in an awkward place.

Keep Clear Space

You should try to keep an area on your desk near your computer always clear. This will give you space to review documents, deal with post, or make notes in a notebook without having to spend time tidying your desk to do so. You might need to be strict with yourself about not letting items sit in the designated clear space when they’re not supposed to be, but it can help you to keep organised and productive in the long run.

If you don’t have the space on your desk to always keep an area clear, re-evaluate what you’re currently keeping there. If there’s anything not essential, such as tools that you don’t use very often, move it elsewhere, such as into a drawer or storage box. Plants are a great addition to your workspace or home office, but you should try to keep them off your desk. Instead, place them on a shelf or windowsill. Our ceramic plant pot is a neat, compact design that won’t take up too much space and also you can mix and match with our pen pot for a stylish and unified workstation.

 

 

Arrange Your Desk According to Your Work Flow

You should arrange your desk equipment in a way that makes sense for your workflow. For example, most people have a tendency to work left to right. So, you can place a letter tray on the left-hand side of your desk, for incoming paperwork. Your computer and keyboard should always be in the middle of the desk, and the phone should be on the side of your dominant hand.

Outgoing items should then be on the right-hand side of the desk. You might want a separate letter tray for this, or you could keep your filing equipment there, such as a hole punch or stapler. Ideally, you would also keep your filing on the left side of your workstation, either on floating shelves or a filing cabinet, to make it easier and more efficient to file your paperwork.

Swap Sticky Notes for a Memo Board

Sticky notes are a common culprit in a cluttered desk. They’re often used for reminders, but when too many are used, they can result in an untidy workstation and will act as a visual distraction. You’re also likely to lose an important reminder under the mess.

Instead, a glass memo board can be used to take quick notes and jot down reminders. Our desktop easel is perfect if you want an A4 size surface area with a compact footprint, to take up less space on the desk. Or you could use our desk notepad which has been designed to fit between your keyboard and monitor, for ease of access and to maximise the available space on your desk. Both glass memo boards are dry erase so they can easily be used over and over again, with no waste and no clutter on your desk.  

Schedule Time to Reorganise

In order to maintain an organised desk, it’s good to get in the habit of tidying up at the end of every day. Take some time to put everything back where it’s supposed to be, file any stray documents, and throw away any rubbish. This will be a huge benefit for you when you come back to work the next morning, and your desk is already organised and tidy. You’ll find it much easier to focus on your work and be productive.

You should also take some time to re-evaluate your setup and ensure it’s still meeting your needs. Think about whether you need to move things around or move anything off our desk that you don’t use very often. You should also consider whether you need any extra equipment to help with your office organising and to keep your desk free of clutter.

 

Leitz has a great range of office equipment to help keep your desk and workspace clean, organised, and stylish. Work more productively by organising your files and projects, with Leitz.

For more tips to keep you organised, read our below articles:

Does Being More Organised When Working Help Boost Productivity?

Do the Aesthetics of Your Workplace Affect Productivity?

The Best Office Organisation Tools You Need for 2022