The Secret To Organisation - The 5S model of Lean Six Sigma

Do you get frustrated by not being able to find something? Do you spend more time in trying to remember where that note was or trying to get back to the thoughts on a specific topic?

The 5S model of lean six sigma could be the solution  to your problems.

It is an organisation method to  ensure efficiency and effectiveness by identifying and storing items used and thinking about standardization  to increase productivity.

The 5S model is great for the workplace and fantastic for getting your personal world in order.

It comes from Japan and was one of the  techniques that enabled just in Time manufacturing.

So what does the 5S model say? Well there are 5 stages.:




1.Sort (Seiri)
2.Set in  order (Seiton)
3.Shine (Seiso)
4.Standardise (Seiketsu)
5.Sustain (Shitsuke)

The names are shown above (with the original Japanese names in  brackets).

So lets dive in to the detail. This is how I see the 5S model.

1.Sort

Everything in your environment needs to be considered. The items that are not necessary (or haven't been used in a while)  need to be thrown/given away. If you really can't throw it away put it in a storage for a couple of weeks and if it hasn't been used throw it away.
Also make work easier by removing obstacles to work.
Remove anything that is unnecessary.
Clear your workspace and desktop and this should make your world a bit clearer, less stressful and more relaxed.

2.Set in order

When anything comes in, into your world , you should think of the following questions:

   i) How will I use this?
  ii) When will I use this?
  iii) What else will I need when I am using this?
  iv) Who else will be using this/ Who else will be involved when I am using it?
  v) Where will I be using  this?
  v) What parts of this will I need/ do I not need

Once you know the answers to these questions, you can allocate in the correct place (e.g on your workspace or in your folders , etc.)
Make sure that all necessary items are correctly placed/stored so they can be easily selected for use.
For reports/work think how will users want to  see this and prepare the work in the format that will answer their predicted questions, efficiently and effectively.
Make it easy to select often used items/ files (Tools such as Workflowy.com or Microsoft OneNote or GoogleDrive are good to keep everything organised and easily accessible (on your computer or mobile)).
Place/file/store items based on their use and frequency of use, with the most often used items, placed in  the easiest to access areas.

3)Shine

Clean your workspace daily
Keep your workspace/filing/storage/documents clean and tidy and pleasing to be/work in.
This means that when you finish anything you should put things away.
This also means that when you finish your work on your computer, you close anything and reboot next morning. This should clear resources and refresh systems.

4)Standardise

Once you have a process that works, establish procedures and schedules to ensure consistency. This should be replicated by other people in your team or in other things that you do.
Ensure that your personal/work routine supports these new practices.
Make these new practices part of your daily routine.

5)Sustain

Make sure that once you have an improved system, this is maintained.
Ensure you track how you are doing to ensure that you do not fall back into bad practices.
Review regularly.

Don't Drown In Email! How To Use Gmail More Efficiently

Do you find yourself getting overwhelmed by your email. Is you email making  you anxious. Here are some great techniques from Andreas Klinger to streamline your email to makeyourself more productive and efficient.

Don't  Drown in Email! How To Use Gmail More Efficiently

If you struggle with keeping on top of your emails in Gmail you want to maybe try my setup. It’s hard for me to lose track and trust me - i am easy to distract

This is how i use Gmail since 2010:

• · GTD - Getting things done
• · An easy to manage, usually empty inbox on the left 
• · All “todos” in the first box 
• · All emails “awaiting a reply” in the second 
• · All “delegated” emails in the third 
• · All emails related to meetings, flights, etc easy to find in the fourth 
• · All done with 0 plugins, using only standard gmail features 

It’s hard to lose overview using that setup

I couldn’t even imagine using gmail any other way. No seriously. I see those messy priority inbox tab inbox systems and I am just scared. Scared that google will someday force me to use those features.

Btw: This approach is not particularly new. I learned it from a person (forgot name) at LeWeb 2010 and it was mentioned on a blogpost which was called “Gmail Ninja” (couldn’t find the link).

HOW I MANAGE DAILY WORK

· An email comes in
· Handle those you can instantly
· The others mark as todo
· If you want to keep track of them when you replied, you mark them as “Awaiting Reply” or “Delegated” (that way you can always quickly find them and follow up)
· You archive all emails
· You inbox on the left is empty again
· All important ones are in the special boxes ones on the right

E.g.

· Received an email
· Was able to reply instantly (if i wouldn’t have had the time i would marked it as yellow bang (Todo))
· I replied
· Marked with “awaiting reply” (question mark)
· Archived the email
· The email is no longer in my inbox but in my “awaiting reply list” on the right side
· His reply will come into my inbox (and we start over with replying instantly or marking as action)
· Archive - Inbox Zero
That’s it! You are done.

Hope fully that workflow also helps you.




INTERESTED? - IT TAKES ABOUT 15 MINUTES TO SET UP…
… but might change how you work with email forever ;)

In a nutshell it’s

· Multiple inboxes
· Special stars
· The multiple inboxes have searches matching the special stars
· Several filters to avoid repetitive tasks
Step by Step guide
Add multiple inboxes






· Go to Settings (you will find it under the cogs icon on the top right)
· Go to Labs
· Enable Multiple Inboxes
· Choose right side layout
Choose the correct special stars






· Go to Settings > General
· Scroll down to Stars
· Add the stars you will want to use
I use:

· Yellow bang for Todo
· Red bang for Important Todo
· Question mark for emails I expect or await a reply. (so i can followup)
· Orange guillemet (double arrow) for emails i delegated to someone but expect to be done. (so i can follow up)
· Purple star for any arranged meeting, flights, event tickets, call or anything else related to an event where i might need to find that stuff quickly.

Filter the inboxes to match the stars






· Go to Settings > Multiple Inboxes
· Switch to right side layout - the option is in the bottom (!)
· Add the filter rules you want for your inboxes

Here is the list of all names of the stars:

· has:red-star
· has:orange-star
· has:green-star
· has:blue-star
· has:purple-star
· has:red-bang
· has:orange-guillemet
· has:yellow-bang
· has:green-check
· has:blue-info
· has:purple-question

You can btw also do more complex filters by adding OR, AND or basically anything else you can use in search. Eg. I use OR to show both important and VERY important todos.

Note on mobile: If you use the mobile Gmail App a lot i would suggest to use the normal yellow star for todo. That way you can at least mark todos in mobile. Unfortunately the other features won’t work as well because the gmail app doesn’t support them.

Enable the inbox layout (aka kill the tabs ;) )

This part is a bit annoying - basically you need to disable a lot of fancy default features of gmail. If the new multiple inbox layout doesn’t appear in your inbox after you finished the guide you might have missed some step here.






· Go to Settings > Inbox
· Switch to “default”
· Turn off any configuration you might have regarding tabs
· Turn off any configuration regarding priority, important emails or filters








· Go to your inbox
· Click on the cog and click on “Configure Inbox”
· Remove everything
· And while you are at it: Switch layout to “compact”

Now reload

Getting to inbox zero the first time

Let me guess you got a lot of emails in front of you right now or? I had several thousands the first time.

You need to get from several thousands it to Inbox Zero. And this needs to happen now. But it’s actually quite easy.






· Go through the first two or three pages of email.
· Mark everything that is a todo with a todo icon (in my case yellow bang).
· Every thread where you had the last email and await a reply mark with your awaiting reply icon (in my case question mark).
· The same for your delegated and events emails.

When you went through the first two or three pages and you have the feeling nothing (still) important appears anymore do the daring move.

· Click select all (the checkbox on the top left)
· Confirm that you really mean all 6523 emails
· And click on archive

Now your inbox should at zero and your right areas full.

MORE GMAIL WORKFLOW TIPS
If you like the suggestion above you might be also interested in my other gmail workflow tips:

Robot the majority of your emails

I am pretty sure you receive dozens of newsletters, groups etc.

· Unsubscribe what you don’t need
· Filter what you only need if you search for it (i do this eg for follower updates etc)
· Filter everything that can be automatically processed (eg all my invoices get a label, all my commercial invoices get a label and are forwarded to my assisstent who will then use it for bookkeeping)




By now i have over 100 filters and i only see new emails if i really need to see them.

Keyboard navigation






· Enable shortcuts in settings

· Learn them

· Most important y for archive, r for reply, a for reply all, s for star

Auto advance






· Choose auto-advance in Settings so you can cycle through your new emails in the morning really fast

Undo sending






· Enable Undo send in Settings > Labs
· Wonder for the rest of your life why this is not a default feature
Merge your email accounts to one



· Screw multiple logins
· Fetch all your email to your main gmail account
· Be sure to use the “smtp” feature to avoid the emails being send as “on behalf of”




· Choose to always reply from the email you got the message sent to
· Ideal if you have private and professional emails coming now to the same inbox

Install rapportive. But i am pretty sure you already have done so. ;)

Update:

A few people mentioned that they suggest using labels instead of stars. Labels are accessible in the mobile app and also in other apps.

Personally I prefer the stars because they are quicker to access. But if you are looking for a way to have the same workflow also accessible in your mobile - labels might be the solution.

Andreas Klinger: http://klinger.io/post/71640845938/dont-drown-in-email-how-to-use-gmail-more