You need to develop a system.
You will develop a system.
It’s irrelevant how you track your responsibilities (HIPAA compliant and legal of course) but you do need to keep track of everything. Never rely on an EMR to keep exclusive track of dates and documents.
Were you trying to make a darn good schedule but found out that you didn't have all your ducks in a row?
Do this for both physical and electronic materials. Remember the #1 rule of baseline: Don’t spend money.
Step 1: Set-Up
You Need A Goal
Before you begin anything else, think of what your goal might be after you've finished. Do you want to have all electronic files? All paper files? Keep everything on a flash drive? Do you need to use bins? Would things work best in binders?
Where will you do this? You will need quite a bit of space to spread everything out. I have done this on a large table, kitchen island or the living room floor. Whatever allows you to move around the area. Label the piles so that you do not undo your work as you are going. QUICKLY though.
Set aside some time. Start with 2 hours. I truly hope it takes less time but we’ll see. If I were to do this for visual and physical program materials I’d set aside a whole workday of time. Either way, once you are to the sort phase, you won’t want to be interrupted.
Pick a
Location
&
Time
Things to Prep before you start:
Container for transporting items
Post-Its or scrap paper
Sharpie
File folders
Step 2: Rapid Gather
Rapid gather is bringing everything you can see, think of, or feel you need together in one area. Walk your house. Start from the further most area from where you will be working on the project. Starting in that room, put everything you can SEE into the basket with you. Everything!
Now, gather anything else you can THINK of from that room. Did you put some stuff in a binder? Check!
Once you feel you have gathered everything from that room, move to the next one. Do not skip a room because you do not think anything is in there. First, check if you can SEE anything in there. Open the closets friends…
As you walk through your home and workspaces your basket will fill. Bring the filled basket to the master location and empty it. To plan ahead, don’t unorganize items. Begin to make piles as things gravitate together or if you have some items sorted.
Gather everything you can see and can find that is related to work and clients. Gather old data sheets and binders etc. no item too big or too small. If you know something is out there, bring it to the area. Do not second guess yourself. Gather all the items. That datasheet from your car? Yes, go get it and the 6 other things. Yes, you can grab the stack of pens too. Toss them into their own pile…you probably did acquire them at/for/while working.
Step 3: Deep Search
Go back to be beginning of the area you started with, look in your drawers, in bags, under boxes. pick up flash drives (just in case) and bring the items to the area. Do not second guess the items you are finding. They might be trash but you can throw them out once you can give a closer look.
Look closer at every space you have already looked. Make sure you are looking in more out of the way locations or where items tend to gravitate in your spaces.
“Electronics Note:
Figure out where your client materials are ending up on your computer. Are they all stored neatly or in a mixture of the desktop, a flash drive (or three) and your downloads folder? Do you have a long-abandoned filing system? Bring all those materials to ONE central location on your computer for right now. In fact, make a new folder on your computer desktop titled CLIENT MATERIALS. Drag everything to that folder. Everything you can see, think of or feel is relevant. Now, do a search for everything you can think of related to your clients. Anything new come up?
”
If you feel you’ve really and truly gathered everything, you should begin to sort.
Step 4: Sort
This is such a fun part!!
Sort all the things into relevant piles. If you have piles that naturally occurred (i.e. by client) do not mess with those right now. If they truly are organic, that may be how you need to organize everything else!
If materials are falling into other categories (i.e. templates, training materials, HR, visual materials, CEUs) begin to build those piles as well. Lately, I have been trying to think of files and titles of files or folders as tags. What would I look for if I was searching online? What keywords would I be looking for? organize your materials and items as they are falling into place.
Right now, do no focus on labeling or making complex judgments about items. If you pick something up and it is clearly junk or trash, pitch it. Otherwise, keep making piles!! Get all the things together to see what you have.
Step 5: Purge
It’s a little embarrassing, isn’t it? Do you have several piles of blank copies of the same data sheet? I know I always do when I complete this exercise!
Moving through each pile, go through and identify the items that can be purged. If you are thinking of making digital copies of items, set aside documents that you will later scan. If you chose to make ONE pile for items to scan, label the individual items with their original category!
As you move on to client-specific piles, there is likely the need to create subfolders or piles.
Step 5: Store
Remember, you do NOT need to spend money. You can do that later!!!
Only after you have gathered your items can you figure out how to organize them.
Here you should try some different ways to keep your items organized. We'll check back with you!
