Ten Minutes Before You Leave: Resetting Your Desk

The end of the day usually passes in a hurry. You send the last email, grab your bag, turn off the lights and leave. When you sit down the next morning, yesterday is still there. Backlogged papers, windows still open, notes that say "how far did I get". The day starts not with tidying but with re-searching.

Ten minutes of tidying before you leave saves ten minutes the next day. There are only three things to clear: paper on the desk, screens left open, and unfinished work still in your head. Throw the paper away or gather it in one place, save and close the screens, and move unfinished work to the top of tomorrow's list as one line.

What a cleared space creates

Once the desk is clear, the morning starts differently. The moment you sit down, what to do is on the desk. It is a kindness the you of yesterday left for the you of today.

Tidying is closer to a procedure than to a personality. People last longer when they have a procedure for tidying than when they tidy through willpower. Set a ten-minute alarm and clear things in order. Some days you will not finish everything. That is fine. Even half a cleared desk makes half of tomorrow lighter.

Carrying it into a record

The unfinished items that come out of tidying are themselves worth recording. Where you got stuck today, what to check tomorrow, who to ask. Those three lines become tomorrow's morning list.

The ten minutes before you leave are not the period at the end of the day. They are the first sentence of tomorrow.