Being organized does not mean being a neat freak. You can be very organized and the sloppiest house keeper on the planet. There are people that tend to function more efficiently in the midst of clutter than they do in the midst of neatness. Remember the movie 'Pretty Woman' ? Julia Roberts played the wife of an abusive husband...he was a neat freak. In one of the movie scenes, Julia is placing can goods into the kitchen cabinets...all the can goods had to be placed label front and stacked neatly according to the food classification. When I watched that, I thought heyyy I am not the only one that does that. However, Julia in the movie is forced to do that because her husband when beat her to a pulp if she had one can facing backwards. So am I a neat freak? No...at this very moment there is dust begging to be whisk away from the mantle, there is floors begging to be swept, and I have needed to place my dishes into the cabinets from the dishwasher for three days! My office most always looks like a tornado has gone through it. Am I organized? YES I am!

That should make it clear that organization and neatness is two seperate things that may or may not go hand in hand.

Your office should be arranged as to how it suits you...not how it will suit your visitors, your house guests, etc. It is IMPORTANT that you are comfortable in your office. Everything in your office needs to arranged so that you can have a pleasant and comfortable work environment...and this does NOT mean a big plush coach and a tv....that is toooo comfortable! Everything from the placement of your desk, to the uprightness of your chair, to the lightening in the room, needs to be adequate according to your own needs. If it's not, perhaps it's a good time to do some rearranging.

Many people rely way too much on their computer for organization. Has your computer ever crashed? Do you place so much stuff on your computer that you cannot find the stuff when you want it? It happen to me years ago...I had a computer crash and lost everything! This is one reason why you need organization and why you need the tools you purchased at the beginning of these steps. If your computer crashes, you'll have loads of information saved offline on your desk.

Organization is also a TIME SAVER. You can have the sloppiest office in the universe but if you can find quickly what you're looking for, more power to you. TIME is very important for most people getting started working online. By utilizing a few good organizational skills/practices, you'll save loads of time and prevent loads of headaches.

Are you a pen person or a pencil person? If you are a pencil person, do your best to use ink pens when in your office. If you are a pencil person and refuse to use an ink pen...do you best to NOT use the eraser on the end OR purchase pencils that have no eraser.

Pick up your small notepad ... the one with the cover that's about 5 by 7 in size. Place it in front of you on your desk. This is going to be one of the most important notebooks you have...and when it becomes full, purchase another. NEVER tear sheets out of this notepad. NEVER erase stuff out of this notepad. This is your JOTTER notepad. You can draw a thin line thru stuff in it but never scribble anything out completely.

This little notepad will most likely be utilized every time you are working at your computer. What do you do with it?

My JOT PAD is like an excutives day planner. Let's take a quick gander at mine and see what I have in it...ok there is some names and phone numbers I jotted down quickly of prospects to call back...there's my norton antivirus key code...there's some domain names I am thinking about purchasing....there's login and password info that I jotted down quickly...there's all my online payment processor login info...there's some ad notes I jotted down quickly from seeing some good ads online....there is all sorts of notes and info that I have jotted in my jot notepad. I NEVER ever erase anything in my jot notepads and when they become full, I place the start and end date on the front and off they go into a drawer in my desk. As time goes by, you may find yourself one day needing some info that you have in the year 2006 jotter notepad.

Many times we make things a whole lot more difficult on ourself simply because we did not jot down a bit of info. Many times that bit of info is lost to use forever and it could be very important info. Many times we may find ourselves searching for hours for some little tad of info that we know we saved .....but where....well I know where.....its most likely in my jotter notepad.

Now you know why you purchased the little notebook. It will save you lots of time and it could even result in you making money and sales simply because you chose to use some organizational methods.

Did you purchase an address book? You should have. I have a big rolodex on my desk and it's great for collecting dust. I don't have time to pull out those cards and write someones name, address, phone number, etc on them. Instead I use an address book that stays on my desk and it's probably the sloppiest address book you would ever view in your life. No I don't write neat in the lines. No I don't follow the alphabet in it either. When a prospect calls you, do you just say hello and answer their questions or do you first find out who they are, what their phone number is, exactly why they are calling you? I always make it a point to get the name and phone number of those that call me. In my address book, I write their name, phone number, and why they called me.