Moving To A New Workspace, Part 2

I’m moving my office workspace again in 2 weeks, this time to the building and floor where my department and colleagues are housed.  It’ll be nice to be working in closer proximity to the folks involved in the same work that I do; however, I’ll admit that what’s particularly exciting about this move is that I’ll also be moving back into an office after 5 years in cubicles. 

When I moved into this particular cubicle about 6 months ago, I vowed to make changes with regards to the clutter on my desktop and in my file drawers.  I reduced the number of training books and manuals I carted along to my new workspace, and I thinned out the office supplies that had accumulated in my drawers.  I thinned out my paper files considerably and prioritized the personal items I would keep on my desktop.

Good thing I had that round of decluttering as the space I moved into was smaller yet.   Even though I brought along less stuff with me, I’ve felt crowded because there’s little space to put things.  With limited shelf and file drawer space, reference materials have taken up residence on the desktop along with the computer and phone.  Given that this is standard issue cubicle office furniture, that leaves very little desktop space left to spread out open files while I’m working.  As a result, I feel distracted when I have to shuffle through layers of open files and frustrated by the subsequent constraints I feel around my creativity and productivity.  In retrospect I see that it hasn’t been a struggle-free working environment.

So an office with the promise of more storage space is definitely appealing; however, I recognize that I need to be watchful that my pack rat mentality doesn’t take over just because I have more space available to me.  As I pack up my cube this time around I intend to continue with my decluttering efforts.  Even though I’ll now have a bookcase available to store my reference materials, the truth is that I still haven’t referred to those training manuals in the past 6 months so out they will go this time around.  If I haven’t used it since I moved into this cube, I don’t plan on taking it along to the office.  I’m looking forward to having my desktop workspace open up as much of what is currently sitting on my desktop will be able to be placed on the bookcase shelves or in file drawers.   

The challenge for my office workspace in 2006 is not so different from the clutter challenge I face in my home.   Akin to housework, decluttering is a process more than a one-time effort.  I find that if I clear out accumulating clutter (emotional as well as physical!) on a regular basis, I can experience more enjoyment from the struggle-free environments that I’ve created for myself, and allow my creativity and productivity to soar.  Onward!

--Dot Snow