Office Organizing
You're on Your Own

Doing any sort of office organizing and expecting others to work with you is tough. Everyone will resist your efforts to make improvements. They'll say things like:

1. It is the way we do things around here.

2. We need permission from management.

3. If it is too organized then I won't be needed.

4. You can't teach an old dog, new tricks.

You will always have to work within the confines of the work environment.

Your best hope of making the best of your work is to do your office organizing on your own. Do what you can to make your part of that world organized and productive.

It can be very difficult to have total productivity in your work if what you need to accomplish is dependent on co-workers.

I am a Civil Engineer. My work mainly consists of preparing construction plans for land development projects. In order to prepare these plans I do some calculations and report writing but the main work is the design.

I take a pencil, scale and straight edge and draw whatever it is that needs to be designed.

When I am satisfied with the design, I trace over the pencil marks with red pen or marker and give the marked-up plan to a CAD draftsman.

They then make the hand drawn design into a digital drawing with CAD software by drawing my pen design with the computer.

When I started this job, the owner said that the engineer's time was too valuble to spend working on the computer. I thought so too. I prefer to design by hand. It is much faster to me and better because I can get it to the CAD draftsman quickly.

I can get a bunch of work to them. It is not unusual for me to have 4 CAD draftsmen working on 4 different projects for me.

On the flip side, the other engineer's in the office need their work done too.

If the CAD operators are busy on other engineer's projects, then my plans wait. And wait. And wait.

Short of learning CAD myself, there is nothing I can do about this. My boss will not pay to send me to CAD training. I could do it myself but the CAD draftsmen will be reluctant to work with me. If I as an engineer can do the CAD work, what will they do? That is the human nature part of any office organizing.

Completing the plans, the most important part of my job, is entirely dependent on CAD operators to produce the final product, the plans on paper and in the computer.

I can only control what I do. I want to get the work to the CAD as rapidly as possible. This serves to put me at the head of the line.

I do my office organizing by doing fast work.

If I am always pushing ahead, then I know that all my projects will get completed on time.

I don't have to beg the boss to let my projects skip to the front of the line. I can just go with the flow.

What I do is to make my little part of the job as organized and productive as possible. I know that trying to change an entire office on my own is impossible. It is impossible even for the boss.

That is really the best you can hope to do in your job. Do your office organizing on your own, for what you can and learn to work as best you can with your co-workers.

Go Back to Home Page.

Go Back to Office Organizing (Top of This Page).