Archives for Events
Unclutterer on the Precision Change podcast
Live now is an episode for Precision Change I recorded titled Tired of the Crap? Become an Unclutterer! with the wonderful Duff McDuffee. You can download the 22 minute podcast or listen to it by clicking on the “Play Now” link at the beginning of the article.
In the conversation, I talk about:
- How clutter doesn’t always start out as clutter.
- Why if you are in a constant state of disorganization now, you absolutely can change.
- What exactly to start on to begin uncluttering your life.
- Why getting a storage unit is almost always a bad idea.
- The machine that will finally give you a paperless office.
- A simple way to clear out kitchen clutter.
- Why uncluttering is really just about finding what makes you happy and what really matters to you.
I look forward to reading your thoughts about the podcast! This is the first time I’ve been a part of a podcast and I must admit that it was a lot of fun.
Popularity: 1% [?]
Send events from Google Calendar to friends’ and family members’ cell phones
If you are an avid Google Calendar user, then you probably already know that you can send yourself text messages about upcoming events on your schedule. But, did you know that you also can send text messages about events to friends and family members with cell phones (even very, very low-tech cell phones)? Here’s how –
When you create an event, click on “edit event details”:
Once the event page appears, enter the contact information for your friends’ and family members’ cell phones as guests for the event:
The contact information for your friends’ and family members’ cell phones consists of their 10 digit cell phone number followed by the extension for their specific carrier. For example, if the cell number is (555) 555-1234 and they have Verizon as their cell phone carrier, you would list 5555551234@vtext.com as a guest. If their carrier is AT&T Wireless, you would list 5555551234@txt.att.net as your guest.
When you choose “save” for your event, a pop-up screen will ask if you want to send your messages to your guests. Choose “send” so your guests will receive an initial invitation to the event. Please note that they will not receive an event reminder if you have one set unless you log into Google Calendar and choose to “e-mail guests” on the events page the day of the event.
Here are a few extensions to help you figure out your friends’ and family members’ contact information for their cell phones:
#telephone#@vtext.com
Verizon
#telephone#@txt.att.net
AT&T Wireless
#telphone#@messaging.sprintpcs.com
Sprint
Standard message charges apply for all carriers.
Popularity: 2% [?]
Getting to know you
To say that I am curious about Unclutterer readers would be an understatement. Thinking about who you are helps me to generate story ideas, and so I’m always wondering what your lives are like and how I might be able to help you.
What content do you want to read? Have you ever taken any of the advice and used it? What is your personal philosophy on simple living? Is there something we’ve discussed that you want us to explore more intensely? Are you just starting out in a place of your own or are you on the verge of downsizing into an active retirement community? What is important to you? What is your story? What do you do in your free time and how can I help you to have less stress?
Since I would love to learn more about you and what makes you tick in our comments section, I feel that I should share a little about me with you:
I grew up in the Midwest and moved to D.C. a little more than eight years ago. I can milk a cow, pluck feathers off a chicken, and identify soybean and barley plants when they’re still in their fields — but I don’t use these skills much in my current life. The chore I hate to do the most is laundry. The area in my house that could use more order is the basement. My preferred design style is mid-century modern with industrial accents. I love cheese, coffee, olives, béarnaise sauce, and wine. I don’t like chocolate. I’m tall, and wish I were about three inches taller. I have watched five episodes of Hannah Montana in an attempt to understand the fascination pre-teens have with Miley Cyrus and still do not get it. When I speak, crayon is pronounced crown. I love telling stories that make people laugh. I’m not obsessed with organization, I’m obsessed with living a simple, remarkable life and being organized is just a tool to help me toward that goal. I love my job.
Now it’s your turn. Tell us about yourself in the comments. Let us know your answers to the questions from the second paragraph of this post. How can we help you be an unclutterer?
Popularity: 9% [?]
How to organize a business meeting
I used to work for an organization that loved meetings. During the course of an average day, I would spend three to five hours in meetings. There were never agendas, people often read directly from PowerPoint presentations, and half of us in the meetings weren’t really sure why we were there. I often was the person in the room mentally estimating everyone’s salary and wondering how much of the organization’s money was being wasted in comparison to the cost of the issue being discussed. After 10 months, I changed jobs because I couldn’t tolerate all the poorly organized meetings.
Since that time, I have come to the conclusion that there are only three circumstances when a business meeting is really necessary. The first situation is when the law requires it — such as shareholder and board of directors’ meetings. The second situation is when untethered brainstorming needs to take place (I’ll describe these meetings and how to organize them in more detail below). And, finally, the third situation when a meeting is worthwhile is what I call off-site, strategy meetings (again, I’ll discuss these in more detail).
Before scheduling any other type of meeting, I think it is best to ask if a meeting is really necessary and the most productive method for conveying information. If it’s well planned and will take less than 15 minutes, a meeting might be an efficient use of everyone’s time. In most cases, though, it’s often better not to have a meeting — especially if that meeting will be disorganized, irrelevant to its attendees, and/or a poor use of resources.
I mentioned the untethered brainstorming meeting above as a good use of meeting time, and I truly believe this is an essential type of meeting for a successful business. If not well organized, these types of meetings can be disastrous. An organized brainstorming meeting, however, can be an amazing gift to a company. To have these meetings, you must first have a team that trusts and respects each other. Without trust and respect, real brainstorming won’t take place and all that will happen is political posturing. Second, you will want to keep attendance at the meeting to 10 people or fewer in most every circumstance. Third, it’s best if the issue to be brainstormed can be e-mailed to everyone 24 hours before the meeting. This gives people time to think about the issue before arriving at the meeting. Next, the meeting should have a three part agenda: 1. Statement of issue to be brainstormed, 2. Brainstorming, and 3. Delegation and statement of future actions and deadlines. Each section should have a set amount of time alloted to it, and a stop watch should be used to stay true to the time commitment. Additionally, it may be helpful to have someone who is not part of the discussion act as a moderator. And, finally, it should go without saying, but the discussion should be lively (maybe even heated) and focus on ideas instead of people. At Unclutterer, our pitch meetings are held in this fashion.
The third meeting type I listed above as an appropriate meeting is the off-site, strategy session. These meetings are best done with teams of 10 or fewer people, and everyone on the team present. An agenda should be circulated at least 24 hours in advance of the meeting. Each item on the agenda should be focused on over-arching strategies within the organization or team building. Avoid presentations, and instead aim for push-up-your-sleeves type discussions. Again, I recommend a timer and a moderator to help keep attendees focused. I’ve found success in telling everyone to bring nothing but themselves and their favorite coffee mug or Nalgene bottle to the meetings (no laptops, no PDAs, no CrackBerries). A blank notebook and writing implement are then furnished to each attendee at the start of the first session. Exemptions to this rule might be reference materials approved before the meeting that are copied and distributed as supplemental information for a discussion. Finally, it is best to have these meetings marked in stone and set on a regular schedule (every six months or at the start of each quarter or once a year). These meetings are what guide an organization or department and should be treated with that level of respect.
How would your job change if you restructured your meetings to only include these three types of meetings? Can you see how your business might improve its productivity? Do you agree or disagree with my organized meeting suggestions? Any horror stories to share about disorganized meetings? Share your ideas with us in the comments.
Popularity: 8% [?]
Unclutter on The Simple Dollar and a (sort of) new e-mail feed!
Our month of sharing is continuing in full force, and today you can read more information from us on The Simple Dollar. The article, titled The Connections Between Mental, Physical, and Financial Clutter, explores mindful consumption and the benefits of not running on automatic pilot. Please check it out and leave a comment to let us know what you think!
While I have your attention, I also wanted to let you know that you can now Subscribe to Unclutterer by e-mail. If you don’t read our blog through an RSS feed reader, you might think about an e-mail subscription. We’ve added a permanent link to our e-mail feed in the middle column in the group of links immediately under our welcome statement. It actually turns out we’ve had an e-mail feed since we started the site last year, but none of us knew about it. More than 500 of our daily readers, in fact, have been receiving it! It wasn’t until we went to create the feed that we discovered its existence. We’re baffled, but excited that we can publicly share it with everyone. This link might also be good to share with others who you know don’t use a feed reader but could enjoy our site through e-mail, so please feel welcome to share it!
Popularity: 5% [?]
Introducing the Real Simple widget
On Wednesday, the amazing Unclutterer programmers launched our Real Simple Widget on our site. Have you seen it? It’s in the middle column immediately below the categories list. You have to scroll a bit, but it’s there!
If you click on the words Real Simple in the widget, they will take you to the Simply Stated: Home community. If you click on a headline, it will take you to the specific post. Two Unclutterer posts are listed at a time, with the top one being our most recent work.
I want to strongly encourage everyone to add the RSS feed to their feed readers. This way you can get our content automatically. To subscribe to the feed of only Unclutterer posts from the Real Simple site, go here. To subscribe to the whole Simply Stated: Home community, go here.
Now that the Real Simple widget is in place and we have a specific Unclutterer RSS feed, I’m planning to stop writing post notifications in our main content. So, if you want to continue to read our Unclutterer posts on the Real Simple website, you’ll want to use the widget or subscribe to the feed.
Please drop me a line in the comments if you have any questions about subscribing to the RSS feed or discover any bugs while using the widget. Also, if you want me to keep posting regular notifications for the Real Simple posts, I’d like to know that, too. Thank you to all of our readers for taking the time and effort to read us throughout the internet, we greatly appreciate it!
Popularity: 6% [?]
Alltop.com lists Unclutterer as a top life hack blog
Alltop.com yesterday listed Unclutterer as a top life hack blog on the internet. We’re excited and humbled by our naming (currently listed as number five in the category!) and want to thank the site’s creators — Guy Kawasaki, Will Mayall, and Kathryn Henkens. The majority of the blogs listed in this category are what appear in my RSS feed program, the blogs I look to for trends and inspiration, and so we’re honored to sit with them on the site. From Alltop’s about page:
You can think of an Alltop site as a “dashboard,” “table of contents,” or even a “digital magazine rack” of the Internet. To be clear, Alltop sites are starting points — they are not destinations per se. The bottom line is that we are trying to enhance your online reading by both displaying stories from the sites that you’re already visiting and helping you discover sites that you didn’t know existed. In this way, our goal is the “cessation of Internet stagnation.”
Be sure to check out the main page of Alltop to explore other blogs considered by this group of whiz kids to be the top in their categories. They’re fun to explore if you have some extra minutes on your hands or want to take a break and relax.
Popularity: 6% [?]
Month of Sharing: Unclutterer all over the internet!
We hope that you enjoyed Elysa from GenPink’s earlier guest post on our site. Now, head on over to GenPink to read our guest post! Elysa is doing an amazing ABCs project (we’re “O” for “Organizing”) with 26 guest writers, and it has been great fun watching each letter unfold. So stop making excuses and get on over there! Go on, go!
Don’t let your web surfing stop there, however. Unclutterer also appears today on Planet Green’s website discussing environmentally friendly alternatives to sticky notes. Planet Green will have a guest post on our site on Wednesday, so be sure to stay tuned for it.
And, while I still have your attention, here are a few more random items:
- Happy St. Patrick’s Day!
- Check out this article from the Wall Street Journal on why the size of your computer monitor affects your productivity.
- Read about the Ultimate Unclutterer here. He’s selling everything in his life — house, job, belongings, friendships — on ebay after a bad divorce. He wants to start over with no ties to his past.
- Happy birthday to my sister-in-law referenced in the GenPink article!
Popularity: 11% [?]
‘Tips to maintain focus while you organize’ over on Real Simple
We are still working out the kinks with the permanent Real Simple badge in the middle column of our site. The amazing Unclutterer programmers keep saying things like “not enough data in the RSS feed to do what you want” and “can’t sparse by author name” and “Erin, your idea is crazy” and a number of other phrases I have chosen not to comprehend. So, until we get everything ironed out, I present to you a good ol’ fashion post.
If you haven’t checked them out this week, please head over to RealSimple.com for the following articles:
You also can subscribe to the RSS feed here.
Popularity: 5% [?]
Month of Sharing: Unclutterer on Zen Habits
A little less than a year ago, I started reading Leo Babauta’s blog Zen Habits. The name of his blog immediately caught my attention — Seriously, who wouldn’t want their habits to take them to a zen-like place?! A few months later, Leo was a driving force behind the creation of the Life Remix network, a network of which we are a proud member. Leo has energy, possesses endless insights on personal productivity, follows through with what he says he’s going to do, and does it all with an unwavering positive attitude.
Next Wednesday, we’re going to feature a guest post on our site from Leo about setting up a minimalist workspace. It’s an inspiring post — he even sent it to me ahead of schedule, which so rarely happens. Since March is the month of sharing at Unclutterer, I also wrote a guest post for Zen Habits, which went live last evening. So please, direct your browsers to Are you an unclutterer or a cleaner? and then stay around Zen Habits and check out his site if you’ve never explored it. You’ll be glad you did.
Popularity: 18% [?]
Intern wanted
Unclutterer.com is looking for a summer intern to be a part of our organized, unclutterer team. This internship pays ZERO DOLLARS, but we will eagerly work with your school to provide you with internship credit. If the zero dollars didn’t run you off and you’re still reading, then look over the following points and see if you could be considered:
- A college sophomore or junior currently enrolled in a journalism program;
- Earned a B+ or better in both Reporting I and Copy Editing I (or their equivalents);
- A basic understanding of html and css;
- Full comprehension that the internship pays nothing but amazing online journalism experience;
- Able to receive course credit from your school for the internship (legally, you have to receive course credit since this is an unpaid internship — so this is a make it or break it item);
- A love for Unclutterer.com; and
- Possess a positive attitude, is a self-starter, and can work productively for hours without falling victim to Chainfactor.com or similarly addictive diversions.
If this sounds like you, please drop us a line on our contact page. Tell us about yourself, how you meet our points of consideration, and provide a way for us to contact you in return. We will reply only to candidates of interest. Please do not include a resume in your initial message, as we’re more interested in looking at how you write about yourself in expository form.
Popularity: 20% [?]
Don’t forget to check us out on RealSimple.com
Programmers are working diligently to put a permanent link in the middle column of our site linking to our new, twice-weekly column on RealSimple.com. In the meantime, let me drop a gentle reminder that you can get even more organization tips and tools from Unclutterer every Tuesday and Thursday through the Simply Stated community.
Check out today’s “Five quick desk organization projects” column for a handful of activities you can do right now to make your office less cluttered. You also can subscribe to the Home and Organizing RSS feed here.
Popularity: 20% [?]
Unclutterer on Decor8
Not only is Decor8 on Unclutterer today, but we’re on Decor8.
If you’ve ever wondered what an Unclutterer’s home looks like on its interior, now is your chance to take a peek. I opened my home to Decor8 and shared a few tips from its style and design. Go on, follow the link, and enjoy!
Popularity: 21% [?]
Unclutterer now appearing twice weekly on RealSimple.com
Starting this week, Unclutterer will blog every Tuesday and Thursday on Real Simple magazine’s website. We’re the “organizing” voice in the home and organizing section of their new Simply Stated community!
Blogging will continue as normal here at Unclutterer — you’ll just be able to go and get even more organization information from us over on Real Simple’s site. It isn’t often that amazing collaboration opportunities like this arise, and we are excited to have such a similar-minded print publication as a new partner. And, the fact that its beginning falls right in line with our month of sharing is terrific, too!
You can check out our introductory post on Real Simple’s site here and subscribe to future posts through the RSS feed here.
Popularity: 23% [?]
March is for sharing
We receive a handful of e-mails a month from readers asking what are some of our favorite blogs and where do we go online to find inspiration. Obviously, we love the heavy hitters like Lifehacker and 43 Folders, but our list doesn’t stop there.
Instead of only providing a laundry list of our favorite sites, we thought that we would bring a little of our favorite sites to you. Throughout the month of March, we’re going to have a series of guest posts from some of our favorite bloggers. Every Wednesday will feature guest content and a few other week days will highlight other bloggers, too. All of their posts will address uncluttering, but on a specific topic relevant to their home blogs.
We hope that you enjoy our sharing project for the month of March, and we look forward to sharing some of our favorite blogs with you!
Popularity: 23% [?]
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