Spring Clean Your Archives & Office

As the year approaches its final quarter and the weather’s starting to get toastier, is it high time for an office spring clean? It might also be time to sort out those piles of documents waiting on your desk.

It was easy to slack off on tidying up during the winter months, and all those weeks of skipping office cleaning could soon rear its nasty head as the warmer weather melts away the winter blues and exposes the amount of cleaning that we’ll all need to do.

As the leading provider of sturdy, premium-quality archive boxes in Australia, we’ll have a box that will suit your organising and storage needs at prices that won’t break the bank.

To help get you and your colleagues get in the spring cleaning spirit, here are our top 5 tips in effectively decluttering your workspace:

Communicate with your Staff

Get your staff into the spring cleaning spirit by sending out an informative and helpful email or memo announcement. Let everyone know that it’s time for a clean up and give helpful tips on how to get clean and organised.

Make your communications as interesting and motivating as possible. Start by telling them exactly why they should take part in the office spring clean. Many people don’t realise just how unclean their working environment really is – so scare them with some unpleasant office hygiene facts!

You should also include information in your email about the cleaning supplies that you have available, and where to find them. This makes it easy for everyone to access the supplies, making them more likely to actually use them.

Divide your office cleaning into sections

Get a good overview of the sections of your office that need the most attention. One of the best approaches to efficient cleaning is to break it down into separate sections. 

Start with the areas that need urgent cleaning first, such as frequently-used areas like desks or lunch rooms. Finish up with one section first before moving on to another.

Organise paperwork and office supplies

From folders, files, notepads, and everything in between - these are among the many miscellaneous objects that are quick to pile up in any office space. 

When old office supplies get replaced with new ones, the old ones tend to linger around the office, not being used but not getting thrown out either. 

It’s a great idea to separate paperwork and office supplies by type. For paperwork, for example, you can separate papers by type, such as “to file” and “to do”, then place those in the “to file” pile to one side while you make an assessment on how many new archive boxes may be needed to store them. 

Order your archive boxes!

Once you’ve figured out how many documents or office supplies you have ready to store or put away, head on over to www.archiveboxes.com.au to buy the boxes that suit your needs. 

We’ll get them to you faster than you can say “storage solutions!” to make your office cleaning process even easier!

Box up your files

Once your boxes have arrived. You are ready to box up your documents! Now follow these steps:

• Audit - take a thorough audit of all your current documents and deciding what can be kept and what can go
• Purge - you should have a nice sized pile of paper that you can finally get rid of completely. After double checking that each document has exceeded it’s legal and recommended retention requirements, you can begin disposing of the documents using the appropriate methods.
• Verify - for documents required to be kept, verify their retention timeframes and accessibility requirements to make sure they are handled and stored correctly.
• Digitise - If you need to access a document frequently or keep it forever, then consider scanning it and making a digital database of files.
• Box up - Make sure you use strong and durable boxes to provide as much protection as possible. Weak boxes or boxes overloaded with heavy files are more susceptible to damage over time. Take note of the box number and its contents so you can easily retrieve the contents in the future.
• Store - store your boxes in either a safe onsite space or choose a secure offsite storage provider to look after your boxes.

Clean your desk

A cluttered desk can create a distracting environment to work in, which would then lead to decreased productivity. 

In a recent Workplace Organisation Survey of 2000 UK workers, 41% said they believed a tidy workspace makes people more productive; 21% admitted that having a cluttered desk has somehow increased their workload, while 20% said a workmate’s messy space has had a negative impact on how much they were able to get done in their working day.

It’s important to keep your desk tidy at all times so that you can maintain optimal productivity and have ease of access to the most crucial items for your work, such as your computer, telephone, notepad, and pen. 

Your desk’s drawers also hold your most important or most current paperwork, so it’s very important to keep this space of your office in top shape.

Then, it’s finally time to relax! 

Having a clean and organised office will help refresh your work mood and will give you a great feeling all spring long! 

Remember, our team is always here to help you with any archive storage needs, especially if you need any boxes.