Home Office Organization

7 Steps to Organize your Home Office for Your Best Efficiency and Productivity

How to Use the Right Home Office Style for Your Work Habits and Taste

Home office organization is an important practice in home-based businesses of all sizes, as it allows you to create a space that bests reflects your own personal work needs and habits, while suiting your tastes and styles. When selecting your furnishings and layout, don’t simply pick the first thing that appeals to you. Put some thought into your requirements and understand the space so that everything can be arranged to encourage the greatest amount of productivity and efficiency. Use the following steps to better organize your home office.

Understand your space

The first step to home office organization is to get down to the basics of the space. Either using a computer program or – more inexpensively – using some graph paper, create a rough layout of the room when it is empty. Try to make it to scale, using the measurements of the room as a guide, so that it will be easiest to work with.

Once you have drawn the room itself, add the elements that cannot be changed, such as doors, windows, heading vents, telephone jacks, and electrical outlets. Next, cut out paper shapes that represent the furniture you are considering for the space. Attempt to make them to scale, too, so that you will be able to visualize how they will fit within the room and in conjunction with each other. This will allow you to experiment with various room layouts and determine whether furniture of certain shapes and sizes will work within the space.

Position your desk

Since the desk is likely to be the largest piece of furniture in the room and will also probably be the most commonly used piece within the space, you should position it first. If you have enough space in which to work, U-shape or L-shape desks are usually considered to be the most effective. Make sure that it is matched with a good quality, comfortable, ergonomic chair. Though the chair should have an adjustable height, if it does not, buy a footrest so that you can minimize back strain. For optional additional space, you can choose a desk with a drop leaf on a hinge, so that it can be raised when more work space is required.

Add proper lighting

Instead of relying only on the ceiling fixture in the room, add task lighting that is adjustable to suit your work needs and space at various points in the room. This will help to ensure that you always have enough light and will minimize the amount of glare on the screen of your monitor or laptop.

Add a small table

Small tables are one of the most useful parts of effective home office and yet they are very commonly overlooked. Place one alongside your desk. A model with a shelf underneath or with two tiers is ideal. This way, you will have a place for reference material or other items that you need to have visible and handy. When working with a tight budget, find a sturdy folding table such as a TV tray.

Arrange the rest of your furnishings

Pay attention to the way that you function when you are working so that you can design your home office accordingly. Have a look at the various parts of your office and consider how frequently you will use them. The more often you will need to use something, the closer it should be to you. Give the best real estate to the items that you will use the most. Equally, anything that you will be using less frequently can be placed further away. This way, you’ll devote the least amount of time to actually accessing the various parts of your office.

Add another chair

As long as you have room, your home office may benefit from a second comfortable chair that is paired with a good reading light. Many people find that when they simply need to sit and read as opposed to actually type at a computer or write at a desk, then getting up and reading in a different kind of comfortable chair can make the process much more enjoyable. 

Place an occasional table near the door

Find a very small occasional table or hang a tiny shelf next to the door. This can hold any item that you will want to remember to bring with you when you leave the room, such as letters that need to be mailed.

With the proper home office layout, you can ensure that you’re not only using the space in the best way possible, but that it will have been specifically designed for your own unique work habits. This way, everything you need will always be nearby, and you will be comfortable and efficient all day long.