1. File: These are the items that need to be kept for reference – insurance documents, product guarantees, invoices… If you don’t have a home filing system, now is the time to start one.
3. Figure-out: These are the things that you’re not sure about. Do I need to keep this? What is the next step? The crucial thing with this pile is that you create an action step to tackle it, for example, ‘call Tom’, then schedule it – otherwise you will simply keep adding items to the pile.
2. Follow-up: Items where an obvious next action step is required – making an appointment, phoning someone back, ordering an item… Schedule a time in your diary for each action.