Declutter Your Work Life with the Marie Kondo Method

Let's face it, with workplaces more complicated than ever before, the need to organize and clean up our work lives is getting ever more important. But it seems that no matter how many times we seem to try doing that, we always get back to where we started. So, what can we do?

Well, the worldwide celebrity, Marie Kondo, might have the answer. While her KonMari approach to cleanliness is without a doubt effective at home, it might be just as useful in your work life, and in this article, we will tell you exactly how you can apply the KonMari method to your workplace starting today.

So let’s read on and find out more!

What Is the KonMari Method?

Before we can go towards implementing it, we must first understand what the KonMari method is. Basically, the KonMari method is the mental and technical approach to cleanliness and organization outlined by Marie Kondo, a world-famous Japanese organizing consultant, in her bestselling book, "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up."

Basically, the method emphasizes the importance of mindfulness, as well as the role that organization and cleanliness play in the way we interact with the spaces around us.

Why Use the KonMari Method of Decluttering?

The thing that makes the KonMari method of decluttering different from other philosophies is that instead of simply guiding you on how to clean once in a while, Marie Kondo teaches you how to think and approach tidiness and organization in a way that makes your living and working spaces more efficient in the long run.

KonMari Method Steps

While the actual philosophy of Marie Kondo is extensive and detailed, for the purposes of this article, the following steps are what should be kept in mind:

1. Be Mindful and Have Gratitude

The central philosophy of the KonMari method is that cleaning up shouldn't be taken as a difficult thing that you have to do but as something that your workspace and the people you share the workspace with deserve. It means being clean every day instead of just once every few months, and it means being mindful about every choice you make about your workspace. 

Bringing that kind of mindset to organization and cleaning will help you whether we are talking about a cubicle's office desk or whether you want to implement your ideal home office setup ideas.

2. Discard First

One of the things Marie Kondo emphasizes the most is that you discard waste items first and organize them later to make sure that they are not stored again, and at a workplace where random items accumulate even faster than at home, doing that is extremely important.

 What this accomplishes is that instead of stuffing all your drawers and cabinets with an ever-increasing list of items that you have to reorganize every time you sit down to tidy up, you will actually have to do less work every time since you would have been progressively removing all the clutter with each clean-up, eventually making tidying a much less daunting task than it is for most people.

3. Tidying by Category

One of the most important innovations made by the KonMari method is that instead of tidying based on space, you will tidy up based on category. This means that instead of, say, you clean your desk, then your file closet, and then your drawers, you will start by cleaning your tools first, then your documentation, and finally all your miscellaneous gadgets and wires.

This approach can be made even more efficient if you have a setup that already divides stuff based on category, like having your setup on a small desk with drawers or maybe a separate small corner desk with drawers, both of which improve efficiency on a daily basis while cutting down the time it takes to clean everything when applying the KonMari method.

4. Go Beyond the Physical World

This is not referring to some secret technique that allows you to astral project, but the fact that the techniques we've mentioned can actually be applied to the digital workspace as well. Things like the storage on your computer, your cloud data, and, most importantly, things like your email and Slack inbox can be hugely disorganized.

And with more and more of our work dependent on the digital world, you should put the same time and effort into caretaking for your digital spaces as you do for your physical ones.

5. Know Your Power Spots

To understand this method, you must first know what a power spot is. Basically, the exact spot in a larger place of productivity, be it a drawer on a desk, a particular shelf in a closet, or in our case, the desk space on a workstation that a person interacts with the most often, is called a power spot.

And knowing your power spots and building your setup around them can be a huge benefit to your overall setup. In fact, most proper desk setups are built around their power spots to improve productivity.

6. Spark Joy

Probably the most famous of Marie Kondo's mantras, sparking joy is more than just a flashy catchphrase. According to Kondo, the purpose of asking if something sparks joy is to ask yourself if the thing contributes to you feeling more positive and if it contributes to your efficiency.

And applying that logic to the workspace can also yield incredible results. It will not only allow you to remove the things that make your workplace cluttered and disorganized if you remove the things that don't contribute to your efficiency, but you will also actually improve your work ethic and your mood on a day-to-day basis.

This can even be applied to the kind of setup you are looking for since instead of choosing a fancy, minimal setup that might sound flashy but will eventually be uncomfortable for you if you are following the KonMari method, you will go for something much more productive like perhaps an ergonomic office setup.

The Bottom Line

The list of benefits and potential applications can go on and on, but as long as you follow these simple suggestions that we mentioned earlier, you will be able to improve your workplace tenfold and manage to keep it that way for as long as you don't give up on the philosophy.

And that covers our guide on applying Marie Kondo's KonMari philosophy to the workspace. We hope you found the guide helpful, and if you did, remember to share this with your friends. With that, stay curious, guys, and thanks for reading.