TM4T - Time Management Basics 15: Paper-Free

You need to accept that you'll never be paper free, but as far as possible try to be electronic.

If you're following TM4T method, you'll have a Yearly Plan as an electronic spreadsheet, and add all key events there, but print out a Weekly Plan which you can annotate. This is the basic model of good practice: only printing out things that you actually need.

Of course, that depends on what tools you have - and can use - in your school. Ideally, you would not print out agendas, or minutes, as long as you can read an electronic version; however, in some schools....

Regardless, you should try not to keep paper (ie file it) unless absolutely necessary. Your electronic communications, however, should be kept routinely, unless there's a reason (eg space) to delete them.

If you are bogged down with paper; if, for example, your desk is covered with the stuff, then you need to attack this issue assertively, clearing out the paper by dumping it, passing it on, or filing it in a simple, easy to find way.

You should also consider the routes by which paper arrives at your desk, and try to minimise the sources.