Hot off the presses: My friend Ariane Benefit of the Neat & Simple Living blog has just published the Neat & Simple Guide to Organizing Your Office. I bought and downloaded it last week (she's offering a special introductory price of $12.95 through February 1) and read it on the plane the other day.
If you're struggling with clutter and organizational challenges in your office, this guide was meant for you. You'll be led through some background about chronic disorganization, motivations for getting more organized, and why you may be "stuck" in a messy situation.
Organize to fit your style
Ariane takes you through an analysis of various working, thinking, and organizing "styles" and discusses how to tailor your organizational scheme to better support your own style. She provides a step-by-step guide to analyzing and dealing with the clutter in your workspace. Another useful section of the guide provides examples of various kinds of organizing tools (bins, shelves, stands, etc.) and discusses the merits and potential pitfalls of each tool. I found this section to be valuable and thought-provoking.
She also offers quite a collection of tips for filing, electronic organization, reinforcing and maintaining you systems, and other hints to help you achieve and maintain success in your quest for organization.
And if you still feel overwhelmed after reading the book, you may need professional (organizational) help. If so, Ariane has a brief discussion on selecting a professional organizer to get you on track.
One last comment on this guide: it just feels organized. It's loaded with useful pictures -- and the layout, graphics, and flow of the book are awesome.