How to Organize Your Desk or Workspace

My writer's workplace does multiple duty as a dumping ground for kids' school stuff, bills, receipts, documents, mail, it all finds its way to me to be processed. So I need organization to get it all done properly. Here is how I manage, for the most part, to keep track of it all.

First and foremost. I cannot manage other peoples' paper work as well as my own work and the family paper work. I don't allow other family members to add 'stuff' to my desk without my permission. School papers that require my attention, bills to pay, those sorts of things are what may go on my desk. If someone leaves his book or papers for college English on my desk, if my daughter leaves her math homework on my desk, they know that I will move it and conveniently forget where. These types of papers are their personal responsibility and not mine. Even my husband has learned to inform me if he places receipts, bills, etc. on my desk. I will attend to those. I will not be responsible for phone numbers jotted on scraps of paper, articles copied from the Internet and random things that are his jurisdiction

Next and equally important. I have a Pend-o-Flex (don't you love the name?) filing system in the bottom drawer of my desk. Pend-o-Flex for those of you too young to remember is a filing cabinet with grooves along the edge. Green horizontal file folders hang by metal hooks from these ridges, opening upward. You can purchase portable plastic stacking file cases that work on the same principle. Each of these file folders is labeled 'Receipts' 'Utilities', 'Sears Credit Card' etc. I also have one for each child. These make filing a breeze. Once a week, I go through and deposit pertinent papers.