If your home office has become a jumble of cords, files, papers, and office supplies, it will not only take you twice as long to find the thing you are looking for but will also hinder your productivity. While keeping the clutter at bay is always challenging, especially when you are working from home, you can use our clever home office storage hacks to make the best use of the available space. Stay with us as we explore some smart ways to organise your home office below.
Home Office Storage Hacks for an Organised Workspace
There are a lot of aspects to designing a home office that offers both form and functionality. Once that’s done, it’s pretty easy to set up an office at home with some basic tips. Things become a little different if you are working from home full time and have a paper-based work environment. In such situations, your home office can become quite messy and require you to incorporate some home office storage solutions into the space. Here are some home office storage ideas that will help you stay organised while saving space.
- Shelving Solutions
- Storage Solutions for Files
- Optimised Furnishing
- Space for Your Memos
- Storing Loose Papers
- Untangling the Wires
- Organising the Desk
- Electronic Storage Options
Let’s discuss these ways to organise your home office in detail below.
Shelving Solutions
If you have converted a small nook in your house into your office, you might not have enough floor space for bulky storage solutions. This is when using the walls is the best idea. Installing shelves above your desk can help you stay organised while saving space. You can opt for floating shelves, floor-to-ceiling bookcases or shelving systems, or design built-in storage into the wall itself.
Adding shelves to your home office can help you store files, folders, decorative items, stationery, and a lot more. If you are going for a custom-designed shelving system, you will also be able to modify the height and width of the shelves to better accommodate your office equipment.
Storage Solutions for Files
Paper-based work environments result in bulky files and folders containing stacks of documents. While you may be able to keep the most recent files on open shelves, you will need something that is a little less open to store previous records. One of the oldest office storage ideas but also one of the most successful ones is to get a filing cabinet or chest of drawers for all your files, folders, and documentation.
When it comes to filing official documentation, you should consider adopting a filing system that is easy to remember and saves time when you want to dig up old records. You can colour code your files, label them, organise them by date or year, or even alphabetically. Since you are the primary user of your home office, the system simply needs to be convenient and efficient enough for you to find what you are looking for, while also keeping that mountain of files in an enclosed storage area where it poses less risk of ruining your home’s aesthetic appeal.
Optimised Furnishing
If you are looking for space-saving storage solutions for your office, choose a desk that gives you optimum functionality and storage space. For instance, if you have a desktop computer set up in your home office, the desk should have a rollout shelf for your keyboard and mouse, as well as storage for your CPU, speakers, printer, and other associated hardware. Even if you work on a laptop, try to accommodate a desk in your office space to give you some surface area for your stationery and a few drawers for storage. You can also check out some DIY desk ideas if you are working from home and want to add a creative touch to your office.
Space for Your Memos
Opting for vertical storage is one of the easiest ways to organise your home office without using additional floor space. But if you do not require shelves for extra storage, consider converting the wall above your desk into a notice board, where you can pin up all your memos, notes, reminders, and plans.
You can achieve this by hanging a soft board, a whiteboard, a chalkboard, or a magnetic board on the wall. You can then use thumb pins, temporary markers, chalks, or small magnets to note down and pin important notices to the wall.
Storing Loose Papers
If you have loose papers flying around the office, consider using a magazine rack or even a basket or a tray to keep the documents in place until you are ready to sort through them. You can also use covered baskets on open shelves to organise your paperwork in a better manner. Ideally, consider labelling the baskets, so you know which ones contain the set of papers that you need to sort through at a later date, and which ones contain documents to be discarded or shredded.
Untangling the Wires
If you have already read our post on some easy tricks to organise your home, you probably already know how to untangle the wires in your home office. But unlike other areas of the house, most offices contain a desk which gives you the perfect cover for your electrical connections. Run the wires from your devices to the switches and hide the access length under or behind your office desk.
You can staple the wires to the wall, use tape to stick them under the desk, or hang them with hooks behind the desk. It is recommended that you label each wire, so you know exactly which one to turn on or disconnect based on your needs.
Organising the Desk
A post on home office storage hacks would be incomplete without some organisation solutions for the desk. If your office desk has a bunch of stationery scattered across the surface, you can convert empty jam jars and mugs into convenient stationery holders for your pens, pencils, and markers. You can also add paperweights to the paper trays we mentioned above to keep the loose sheets in place.
You’ll also be able to find colourful or even themed desktop organisers in stationery shops that offer a combination of paper trays, stationery holders, and tape dispensers. They often come stocked with thumb pins and paper clips as well.
Electronic Storage Options
If you truly want to save space in your home office, consider digitalising all your records. Electronic storage solutions offer convenience and a chance to go paperless. Compiling all your data into an external hard drive or a USB is a quick, efficient, and sure-fire way to not just store data, but also to make it easily available whenever needed.
You will no longer need to dig through a tall stack of files for a particular record or entry. Sharing data will also become easier via various electronic methods, like emails, instant messaging services, and cloud storage solutions. Always create a backup of the digital data, though, in case the storage device gets corrupted or is attacked by a virus.
Now you know about some of the best home office storage hacks that you can use to save space and become more productive. Use these home office organisation tips for a clutter-free workspace.
Keep reading more home organisation posts on Zameen Blog. We are also just an email away for your tips and suggestions. You can send us your views on blog@zameen.com.
