3 Ways To Control Your Office Clutter

I tend to be most productive and efficient when my workspace is neat and organized. Despite knowing this, my home office still tends to slide toward a natural state of barely controlled chaos. My piles of paper beget other piles, my sticky notes threaten to obscure my computer screen, and my inbox often overflows with non-crucial items like magazine clippings, invitations and a half-eaten granola bar.

As the mess gets worse, so does my focus. It's not just that there are so many potential distractions ("I really need to file those papers..."). It's that there's so much physical clutter that it translates to psychic clutter, so I can no longer concentrate completely on the task at hand. It's like self-imposed ADD. And that's hell on productivity.

Obviously, I need to get (and keep!) my office in order. Here are three hot tips I found that'll get me -- and maybe you -- on the road to neatness.

• Lisa Hendey of Productivity @ Home offers resources and ideas to help me declutter in less than an hour.
• Once my office is cleaned up, I can keep it that way by organizing for just 10 minutes each day, according to Life Organizers.
• Finally, I'm going "defrag" my office for increased efficiency with a few simple workspace organization techniques from Lifehacker.