Taming the Paperwork Beast

aperwork is an ever-present part of most people’s work lives. Anyone with a position of any greater prestige than the burger-flipper at the local fast food restaurant most likely has to deal with paperwork at some level. And you may have discovered, as many people have, that papers have a tendency to pile up. Things get mixed together, lost, and jumbled, leaving you spending hours going through endless stacks of the stuff looking for that one lone order form or bill that you need right away.

Although this sort of frustration and wasted time is all too common, it is by no means necessary. There are simple ways to be sure you will not run into this sort of trouble with your documents. The first and most important rule is to put everything away and filing them in folders when you do not need them. The easiest way to lose track of papers is to leave them laying around where they can be shuffled together, slid under something, mistakenly thrown into the trash bin, or fall into a corner somewhere.

Once the documents are filed away, you need to be able to quickly and easily find the papers you need at any given time. Be sure to clearly label your folders to avoid confusion as to where a specific paper or document might be filed. Also, you should consider using a color coding system to organize your files so you can easily find something at a glance. A black folder, for instance, may be used for your professional documents, a blue folder for personal documents and a brown folder for filial asset documents, and so on. This will help streamline your filing and retrieving process. Keep a note posted somewhere nearby of what each color means, in case anyone else needs to find something in your files.

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