Being messy means more productivity

D Tomlinson says on March 22nd, 2007 at 7:29 pm

It always makes me wonder how busy these people with tidy desks really are. I don’t tidy my desk because I spend my full working day working. And I rarely have trouble finding anything at work… that is, until someone else decides to move something because ‘it must be lost’! When tidied, I tend to find whatever I have just organised (put in a drawer) needs to be unorganised (removed from said drawer) in order to use it for the next task. Organised chaos is the way forward for me!

elmegil says on March 22nd, 2007 at 8:28 pm

Baloney. Hyper-clean people, yes, they waste time just cleaning, just like the GTD-ers who are continually tweaking their system instead of getting things done.

Hyper-messy people, however, are NOT more productive. I used to lie to myself about being able to find anything in my mess, but no more. Most things? Yes. The critical things? Absolutely. But by no means everything. I’ve wasted too much of my life shuffling through my piles.

That doesn’t mean I’m not still messy, by the way, it just means that I’ve stopped making excuses and pretending my mess is somehow better than organized people’s non-mess.

There’s a big difference between the chaos of a desk where work is being done and that of a desk where the owner is simply messy. A completely empty desk is ridiculously over cleaned, but a completely messy desk is one major distraction away from becoming a disaster.

Tom says on March 22nd, 2007 at 8:41 pm

Productivy?

BillOGoods says on March 22nd, 2007 at 9:59 pm

Of course being messy means more productivity for the messy person. But what’s not necessarily seen is that the messy person causes three other people to be less productive for, instead of doing their job, they have to clean up, find, and redo what the messy, but perceived “productive” person has fowled, lost, or botched.

But I’m not bitter. Not at all.

jboy says on March 22nd, 2007 at 11:20 pm

This is pretty ridiculous. Productivity is enhanced by being able to quickly find all the right stuff when you need it.

Quickly = like within a minute. This is my boss (though actually not that unorganized), “Did you get the fax I sent?” Me, “No??.” Boss, “Okay, one second”….(in the background papers shuffling, then “urhg,” more papers shuffling, “URHG,” somthing slams, “Sh*t, Dam*t.” Not aware that I can hear everything (and am now slightly chuckling), he comes back on the phone, “Uh, I’ll call you back with it.” THIS, happens all the time. And, he does at least have his “stuff” separated into big files (although some subdivision would help him). I simply do not think the guy who is actually messy is going to perform any better than my somewhat disorganized boss.

All the right stuff = everything from today and two months ago. That way you don’t miss important details (which would lead to screwing somthing up, which would lead to redoing the screwed up thing, which would = lower productivity).

When you need it = see above example.

Really, trying to argue that messy people are more productive is just an attempt at rationalizing bad, lazy, and unproductive behavior. Sure, if you are in the middle of working on somthing, you will have papers on your desk - maybe even scattered papers. But, it takes a couple minutes (or less) to put everything back in its place at the end of the day (or task). Then, you can even wipe the desk down with some pledge wipes or somthing. I have a clean desk. I work on at several completely different projects everyday. When I have finished what I am doing on a project for the day (or for the next couple hours), I file everything back, so I can find it when I need it again (be it in 3 hours or the next day). Papers don’t get lost, papers don’t get mixed, and I at least feel more productive because for the moment I am working on any particular project , I am working only on that project.

Alan says on March 23rd, 2007 at 12:00 am

I think it’s based on the person’s way of living. I’ve seen someone being organized and it doesn’t take him too much time in organizing his things. Maybe he always return the things he used to it’s rightful place. I think it’s the same with unogranized people. They just know where they left their things so that it’s not difficult for them to find.

RajDash says on March 23rd, 2007 at 12:27 am

Obviously from the comments, this sort of thing is person-dependent. Though my experience is that if I leave something where it lies, I know where it is.

Let’s look at this from another viewpoint. Productive people might actually have a better 3d spatial sense and thus find that for their filing system to work, they cannot neatly stack things in orderly fashion. I don’t know. Just throwing it out there. It works for me.

Choong Wei Tjeng says on March 23rd, 2007 at 2:42 am

Different tools for different people. There’s no right or wrong side here; just what’s right or wrong _for you_. As with everything in life, read the advice, pick up the parts you can use, and discard the rest.

Just because something works really well for someone else, doesn’t mean it’ll work well for you too.

K D says on March 23rd, 2007 at 9:09 am

I disagree that being messy is more productive. I’m in a transition stage between Messy and Organized. It’s taken me 3 years to get to this point, and I much prefer being more organized than messy. Messy causes me mental stress because of the stuff I’m forgetting and things that have been misplaced. The “Natural Reminders” that I find in my stacks actually give me panic attacks.

I much prefer having everything filed away with a notepad on my desk that has written “reminders” of what I need to do.

I don’t intend to every ben OCD about neatness - that comes with its own problems, but I’m far more relaxed and productive when I keep my office neat.

Ernie Oporto says on March 23rd, 2007 at 12:24 pm

Everything in moderation.

NovMan says on March 23rd, 2007 at 12:46 pm

At work, I’m pretty organized. I started out in the job disorganized but it negatively impacted my work. It would take me longer to do the same work, and I hate spending more time on something than I have to. When I organized better, I’m able to compress more work into a shorter amount of time, and not feel as rushed. I can then take a little time to chat with people, knowing my work is done. Instead of being stressed out, I’m more relaxed. At home, it’s a different story - I’m very messy at home, and I’m trying to change that.

Elissa says on March 24th, 2007 at 9:09 pm

If you are taking extra time to organize then you are not well organized. Someone who is organized has everything at hand and intuitive enough that it doesn’t take much extra effort to keep it that way.

Dysinger says on March 25th, 2007 at 7:29 pm

That’s such a pile of BS. Messy people are messy. That is all.

Messy people, in my experience, are disorganized and are sloppy in there work.

Messy Cooks = Cleaner Faster Food?
Messy Doctors = Better More Careufl Care?
Messy Air Traffic Controllers = Less Crashing?

Yeah right. The only thing that messy does is “work” as an excuse for the messy person.

Pamela says on March 25th, 2007 at 10:36 pm

I agree with jboy. His comment pointed out a reality. People have their own way of organizing and it doesn’t mean that it takes the same time for people to be organized. Others probably spend a lot of time organizing but it may be a quick job for others.

yp says on May 19th, 2008 at 9:10 pm

I’m actually doing research on “messiness,” or environmental chaos and creativity/productivity. For years I have endured what I thought was unfair slander upon my housekeeping and personal workspace habits. What I have found is this: yes, people who appear sloppier or more disorganized tend to be able to transcend their personal environments more easily to enter the world of ideas, as opposed to their outer-directed, and status oriented cohorts.
There are many scientists, artists, and highly arcane humanistic thinkers who have enjoyed “sloppy” personal spaces: Einstein was one of the biggest messes; Churchill was known for masses of papers, half eaten sandwiches and stogies cluttering his office. My father, a well-regarded astro-physicist and highly musically creative person, used to have to beg the janitors at his office not to remove any debris from his work-space, lest he lose his creative train of thought.
I have also found in my research that people who are outwardly more organized or “neater” score lower on scales for emotional access and cognition. In other words, they tend to avoid the experience of the inner self more often, and report higher levels of anxiety in experiencing certain emotions. In it’s extreme form, this is clinically called alexithymia, an emotional affect deficit. People with this personality construct report a paucity of fantasies, remember their dreams less often, and often cannot sort or verbalize their emotional states, preffering instead to avoid them altogether.
Further, people with this construct are more outwardly rigid, preferring to focus energy and attention on controlling their outward environments, as opposed to engaging their brainstorming right-brained, lobes.
Food for thought for the people who like criticize and deride their less neat and orderly cohorts as lazy (a description that I always found unbelievably inaccurate) or slobs.

YP,
Social Researcher