As a productive freelance writer you want a clean and clutter-free home office. A big part of that is efficient handling of papers, books, and magazines. Otherwise they will bury your desk, your work, and your creativity.

Here’s what I do…
Papers
Handle a piece of paper only once if at all possible. If it’s a letter or bill, act on it. If you need to keep it, immediately file it. If you don’t need it, recycle it if you can or throw it away if you can’t. For paper you truly can’t deal with at once, use a set of stacking in-baskets to place the paper for future action.
For paper you need to keep long-term, use file cabinets with hanging file folders, with each folder properly labeled. Don’t let piles of paper build up in your office. You’ll waste time and energy trying to find things, and the overall clutter will drag you down psychologically and reduce your productivity.
Books
Of course you’ll need bookshelves. Get whatever ones suit your taste and your budget, just be sure they’re sturdy and will hold all your heavy books without the shelves collapsing or the entire bookcase tipping over. I have a set of bookshelves 6 feet high, plus storage on built-in shelves in a walk-in closet off my home office.
I arrange my books by subject area so I can always find any given book quickly. If you like, you can arrange your books within subject areas by author, although I’m not that particular. I like quickly scanning book titles to find the one I want; frequently I’ll see one or more other books I also need, but didn’t realize I needed. I also keep one shelf reserved solely for books covering my current writing projects.
Magazines/Periodicals
Subscribe to only those periodicals that help your career or some other important part of your life. Local libraries have many magazines that you can either read there or check out. I used to subscribe to lots of magazines, but I found that reading all of them was not a high enough priority for me, so they just accumulated until I finally recycled them. Over the last year I have canceled or not renewed all of my magazine subscriptions.
As with other paper, have a place for unread magazines in one of your stacking in-baskets. When you do get to your magazines, quickly select the articles you want to read, rip them out, and either read them right then with highlighter in hand or save them for later reading when you have spare time. When you have finished reading the ripped pages, place them in your file cabinets or recycle them.
Your Take
On a 1-10 scale, how well organized are your books, papers, and magazines and periodicals? Which of the suggestions presented here is most important for you to implement right now? Any suggestions to add?
Hi John,
Nice list! I think most writers by nature are collectors of information — and by extension, collectors of the pieces of paper that they come on. It’s good to have a strategy to tackle them before they become overwhelming.
One thing I would add — I once had just a file cabinet system, but now I use a external file holder too that sits on a table. This contains my current projects and is always in arm’s reach so if a client calls or I’m simply ready to move on to the next task of the day, I just pluck the file folder. (Drove me nuts opening and closing that file cabinet 7 times a day…)
~Graham
Thanks for stopping by Graham.
I really like your idea of the external file folder on the desk for all your current projects. I tend to have only a couple of fairly large projects going at a time, so I don’t need much material close at hand, but I know many writers who could put your advice to good use.
I’ve always said I want to be you when I grow up, John. 😉
As far as my grade, it depends on what point in time you catch me. I go in spurts of extreme organization, but admit I slide every now and then. Typically, I don’t slide for very long for the reason you wrote about – I can’t stand when I waste time looking for something. So, I’ll do a get organized timeout.
One thing I’ve found helpful is I have my shredder next to my printer. If there’s confidential information I can get rid of, I simply pop it into the shredder. Thanks for another great post, John.
Cathy, I also occasionally need to “get organized.” It’s usually a spontaneous decision to just get everything in its place.
I don’t have a shredder (I do that by hand!), but I do have a recycle box and trash can right by my desk.
Great post. Simple, concise, do-able. I learned years ago to never go check the mailbox until I’m ready to deal with EVERY piece of mail in there immediately. (I guess that’s part of the concise “Handle a piece of paper only once” theory.) That has been the start of an increasingly better organization of my own home office. My husband’s organization skills are seriously lacking. I’m the one who files the bills immediately, keeps family paperwork organized, etc. He’ll ask me where something is before searching on his own, because he knows I can find it in minutes.
Having said that, I also know I have a long way to go. And since I come from a background of semi-hoarding (my grandmother), I know how to be patient as my husband learns to be more organized.
Linda, I’ve struggled over the years in deciding what to keep and what to get rid of, both with paper and with books. Recently I’ve gotten much better with handling paper and I’ve given away over half of my books.
And I’m not surprised that you are more organized than your husband!
That looks like my home office, except I battle for desk space with two cats. They are looking for love in all the wrong places. I try to maintain a fairly paper-free business but the practice of law was designed to kill as many trees as possible so it is very difficult to go paperless. Client files are kept very organized but for my own business work there are stacks upon stacks of paper/magazines/mail/etc. waiting to be processed to related to something that I am working on. It’s quite messy but I have seen many lawyers with offices that could be mistaken for a paper landfill.
Adam, cats can be a real challenge. A clean desk gives them less to play with.
Look here on PW in the near future for a post on dealing with pets in the home office.
I’m not so sure. Less clutter just gives them an opportunity to sprawl out more but somehow a head or leg ends up across the keyboard anyway.
I thought I’d take a moment to point out that you’re dead wrong (as is that Graham Strong fellow who commented).
In fact, if you walk in a straight line from your office door to your desk — without being forced to detour around a pile of some kind of paper — then your office is simply too neat.
Reams of government-funded research prove I’m right (and I’ve got notes on that research somewhere, just give me a minute…).
Remember — leave all those “important” papers in a pile somewhere in the corner, and eventually they’ll become unimportant, and you can simply throw them away.
No simpler file system — or productivity booster — exists.
Repent, neatniks. Before I’m forced to chastise you again.
You are absolutely right Tom. I hereby reject everything I said in this post!
Ha – sorry, I was under the misapprehension that this was a “guide” for effective “organizing”, not a 60 Minutes “investigation” into “the truth about copywriting”.
It might help bridge those two thoughts to mention that I have three such Current Projects file holders, one of which hasn’t been looked at in at least a year, and another sitting inside a box of “these papers are probably garbage, but I should hold onto them just a bit longer in case I need them”.
Thought that might be a bit too man-behind-the-curtain though…
Love the “Very Important Papers” pile filing technique you mentioned. Very Ozymandias-ish — it’s importance definitely diminishes over time. (Though on the down side, you’re always looking upon your works and despairing…)
~Graham
Like most geniuses, my brilliance won’t be wholly understood by the universe until after my death, which — if I try to walk to my office door from my desk after turning off the lights — might come relatively soon.
Good suggestions. I have a lifelong issue with mail clutter. I have filing cabinets. I have filing boxes. And yet when the mail comes in, unless it’s a check, I put it on the coffee table until I get tired of looking at it piling up and finally deal with it. Most of my bills are paperless or direct withdrawal from my bank account so I don’t have to think about it – or I’d be in a real mess!
Books – not a problem. I have bookshelves and I downsized a lot of books the last time we moved and I’ve switched mostly to ebooks. A lot lighter when the next moving day comes around!
Magazines – I have a subscription to Canadian Living because it seems unpatriotic not to and I always seem to find a good 2 year renewal being offered for $20 or $25 but if I don’t find a good renewal deal by next summer when it expires I might let it go. Once I read them I toss them in the recycle bin. Same with the odd freebie magazine that shows up. I used to hang on to magazines, and I remember New Woman that I had a subscription to for around 10 years and kept them all in a bookshelf. They were a really good magazine in the 80’s but by the mid 90’s they went off in a direction that didn’t interest me and I stopped my subscription. A couple of years later they closed their doors so I guess I wasn’t alone in deciding the big changes didn’t suit me! About 10 or 12 years ago I finally looked at the magazines in my bookcase and decided it was unlikely I was ever going to read any of them again and took them to the recycle bin.
Cheryl, I also used to save magazines. I thought I’d get around to reading them someday, but someday never came.
I’ve also gone nearly paperless with bills, so that helps a lot. In addition, I wrote to the Direct Marketers Association and put a stop to nearly all junk mail.
Not fair… I just moved!
The biggest help for pets is a door that shuts. MzTiz is usually fine in the office… sleeps on a small table – not this morning. But shutting her out for an hour reminded her…
I still like reading some magazines by paper. They stack up and I have people I pass them on to.
No shredder here either, John, but a similar recycling bin that gets full amazingly fast.
But I’m not a neatnik by anyone’s standards.
Anne, I have to confess that I subscribe to the Medford Mail Tribune and that there’s a stack of the unread ones in one corner of my office (from when I’m traveling).
I do appreciate having a daily paper to read, though; it’s one of the few pleasures I’ve had throughout my adult life.
Hi John, thanks for a really good article. I find for myself that I cannot work surrounded by clutter, and need a minimalist desk and office space. It’s interesting that almost to the tee I had created for myself a paper handling system almost identical to yours 🙂 Hundredth monkey syndrome I suppose. Anyway, thanks for the tips!
Mel
Hi John – I want to purchase “Writing College Textbook Supplements”, but can’t seem to find a link from your site. I’m thinking it’s better for you if I purchase through you rather than something like Amazon. What am I overlooking on your site….please let me know best way. Thanks so much! A New & Great Fan…..Betsy Kostas
Hello Betsy,
I just sent you an e-mail with the link. I had an error in the link to the page in the sidebar, which is fixed now.
Ah some great tips indeed for how to deal with piles of paper. I have to admit I am prone to stacking papers as high as I can on my desk, in the hope they will organise themselves, I think I will put your tips to good use.
+1 on the getting rid of the magazine subscriptions. I used to have several myself. But over time I realized that for most of them the writing quality had plummeted and they offered next to nothing that I couldn’t find elsewhere- usually online. And even more so many of them have websites now where much of what’s in the print version is posted as well further degrading the need for the physical item.
Oh John, you must be able to see my desk. 😉
Well, if 1 is awful and 10 is perfect, I’m about a 4.
Actually, I did clean up over the weekend. But your post is always timely. My friend was an admin, and her advice was your first point — touch it once.
I’m fortunate to be sitting in a study with bookcases, so I do have room (in theory) for business books that come in. However, there are a LOT of books in this house, so I have to be choosy. I’ve taken to buying business books in electronic form only because I know they won’t clutter up the space and I won’t be tempted to toss them without reading them.
Periodicals are another matter. The business ones that come in get read and tossed. If it’s useful, I’ll put it on the bookshelf. If not, it’s history.
My worst offense is file folders. I’m a file folder addict. I’ll put papers in files and never look at them again. I think I need the folder. I think I need those reams of paper I’ve printed and put in there. In fact, I don’t. My agreements and contracts do need a place, but I think I could probably get away with one folder for them all instead of the dozen or more folders that hold, well, junk.
Lori, one of these days I’ll do a post of pics of everyone’s desks!
I’ve actually gotten a bit sloppy with a couple of shelves in the bookcase by my desk. They are covered with mail and unread newspapers. They are on my to-do list for clean up this week.
John, just discovered you! Really a productive move on my part:-)
Im not into file folders, Lori, but I can understand! I prefer 3 ring binders on varying subjects. This way is easier for me to breeze through and wherever the words come from (via the web, magazine, or me!)they can all go into ‘booklet’ form and easy access.
Follow up has always been a challenge to me. Carol Tice (of Freelance Writers Den) prefers not. She feels if they’re going to contact her, they’ll do so, whats the point of keeping track?…any other opinions out there?