Monday July 30, 2007
Monday July 30, 2007
Nirvana is a Paperless Office
As Roumen reported, in NetBeans Is Moving!, NetBeans is moving. Or, in fact, has already moved, to the other end of town. In doing so, I have begun implementing my long cherished dream... a paperless office. Not only because you can't lose papers that you don't have, not only because cleanliness is next to godliness, not only because Al Gore would be proud of me, not only because of the ethical soundness of the principle, but because a workspace that is permanently denuded of chaos has a pleasing and soothing effect, conveying (at least the intention of) order and and simplicity:
Before I forget them, here are my personal tips and tricks for establishing and maintaining a paperless office:
- Don't move your stuff. When you move to a different office (as we have just done), grab the opportunity to not move all your stuff with you. Destroy it all. (Or cheat and take it home, creating a paperless office at the cost of a chaotic home environment.)
- Don't connect to the printer. Once you are in your fresh, new, pristine office: Don't set up a connection to the printer! If you can't print, you won't generate paper, will you?
- Avoid getting access to your drawers and cupboards. Notice the cupboards above my desk in the picture above? They were locked when I got here. I'm supposed to go somewhere and pick up the keys for these cupboards. My advice: Don't go and pick up those keys! If you can't put stuff in your cupboards, because they are locked, then useless stuff that you should just throw away (and that you probably won't have much of anyway since you can't print) won't collect in your cupboards or drawers (or other similar junk-collecting containers).
- Be ever watchful. Whenever you find yourself with something in your hand, ask yourself if you need it to be there and whether you can avoid taking it to your desk. If you can't avoid taking it to your desk (from which it will become increasingly difficult to remove, because the longer it is there, the greater the significance it will attain), put it in your bag, instead of on your desk. Okay, that's cheating, but you're more likely to empty your bag than clean your desk. Or maybe that's just me. (When placed on a solid surface, the weight of an object increases in proportion to the length of time it isn't moved. Based on empirical research, I have found this axiom to be unfailingly true.)
- Blog about your intention to maintain a paperless office. Once you've blogged about it, you can't go back. You've reached the point of no return. Paperless is what you said and paperless is what it will have to be for ever after. Chances are that you will get mocked by colleagues as soon as paper starts collecting on your desk, which is further incentive for maintaining paperlessness.
So, this is me, in my new home, i.e., the little corner of the Sun world that is my new paperless office:
And guess who the twists and turns of fate have conjured up as my new neighbor...
Jul 30 2007, 07:45:28 AM PDT Permalink
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