Career Advice - How to be Organized
Organization is one of those skills that doesn’t sound flashy, but quietly determines how far you’ll go in your career.
Whether you’re just starting out or you’ve been in the workforce for decades, being organized acts as a force multiplier for nearly every other professional skill: ownership, communication, dependability, and time management. You can be strong in all of those areas, but without organization, your effectiveness will always be capped.
Organization and time management often get lumped together, but they’re not the same thing. Time management is about how you spend your time. Organization is about knowing what exists, where it is, and when it matters. One supports the other, but they are not interchangeable.
What Does It Mean to Be Organized?
At its core, being organized means having situational awareness of your work.
It means knowing:
- When tasks and deliverables are due
- When meetings are happening (and what they’re about)
- Where files, notes, and documentation live
- What resources you need to complete your work
- What depends on you, and what you’re waiting on from others
Boiled down to its simplest form: organization is knowing what needs to be done, when it needs to be done, and where everything lives.
Highly organized people aren’t smarter or working harder, they’ve just reduced the mental overhead of remembering everything.
Why Organization Breaks Down (Even Today)
With modern technology, organization should be easier than ever. We have calendars, reminders, cloud storage, and task managers everywhere. Yet many people still struggle. Why?
Because organization isn’t about tools, it’s about habits. And people are just bad at habits that take a bit of effort.
- People don’t trust their systems, so they keep things “in their head”
- They start systems but don’t maintain them
- They overcomplicate their setup and abandon it
- They confuse “being busy” with “being organized”
Organization only works if you consistently use a small number of tools and treat them as your single source of truth.
How to Be Organized
1. Start With a Calendar
The simplest and most powerful organizational tool has existed for centuries - a calendar.
Your calendar should contain:
- Meetings (obviously)
- Deadlines
- Time-blocked work sessions (when appropriate)
- Personal commitments that affect availability
If something has a specific date or time, it goes on the calendar. Period.
A common mistake is treating calendars as “meeting trackers.” In reality, your calendar should represent future obligations, not just scheduled calls.
Pro tip: I add deadlines as "all-day-events" to my calendar but keep the status as "free". That way I can easily see deadlines yet my time is open.
2. Use One Task List, Not Five
You need one place where tasks live. Not a collection of:
- A notebook
- A sticky note
- An email inbox
- A second app “just for big stuff”
- A mental list
Pick a single task system and use it relentlessly. If it’s not written down, it doesn’t exist.
A good task list answers:
- What needs to be done?
- What’s the next action?
- What’s blocked?
- What’s overdue?
My preferred method is a pocket-sized yellow notepad with a margin. The size forces me to use short task descriptions and the margins allow for dates/actions/notes. I also put the small notepad in my notebook when I travel.
3. Decide Where Information Lives
Disorganization often comes from searching, not doing.
You should know:
- Where meeting notes go
- Where reference documents live
- Where decisions are recorded
- Where you track open questions
If you ever think “I know I wrote this somewhere…”, your system needs tightening.
Consistency beats perfection. A mediocre system used consistently is better than a perfect one you don’t trust.
4. Build a Simple Weekly Reset
Highly organized people don’t stay organized by accident, they reset regularly.
Once a week:
- Review your calendar
- Review your task list
- Close completed tasks
- Clarify vague tasks
- Prepare for upcoming deadlines
This habit alone will put you ahead of most professionals.
I do this every Monday morning by writing a new set of tasks list. That way I see what is still left from the week prior and what has been added. Writing it forces me to think about every task.
5. Organization Is a Courtesy to Others
Being organized isn’t just about personal productivity, it’s about respect.
When you’re organized:
- You show up prepared
- You don’t miss deadlines
- You follow up without being reminded
- You don’t waste other people’s time
That reputation compounds quickly.
Tools That Help You Stay Organized
You only need a few categories of tools:
- Calendar – for time-based commitments
- Task Manager – for action items
- Notes / Knowledge Base – for information and context
- File Storage – for documents and assets
The key is not which tools you pick, but that you clearly define what each tool is for.
Specific Software
I wrote and re-wrote this section several times when I realized that the reason I had to re-write it several times is how quickly software changes. Software I was using in my 20s is now non-existent. Software I used in my early career has either been absorbed by Microsoft or other large companies, no longer supported or has been surpassed by better, lighter and more powerful software. The only constant has been Outlook Calendar. So there, that's the only piece of evergreen software I can recommend. You have to do your research for the other 3 tools at the time of reading this article.
The only piece of advice I have in this category is - if you’re early in your career, simpler is better. Complexity should grow only when your workload demands it.
Final Thoughts
Organization isn’t about being rigid or obsessive, it’s about freeing mental space so you can focus on meaningful work.
The goal is not to remember everything. The goal is to build systems you trust so you don’t have to.
If you combine organization with ownership, dependability, and communication, you stop reacting to work, and start controlling it.
