How tidiness or mess on your desk affects your work, and what experts and studies have to say about it.
There is this famous image of Albert Einstein’s workplace. Taken on the day he died, 15 April 1955, it shows the desk of the father of relativity theory – or rather the chaos at the centre of which the theoretical physicist pursued his research. Einstein’s office chair marks the focal point of several concentric circles of paper stacks, loose sheets, piles of books and notebooks. The shelves in the background look hastily and makeshiftly filled – more like a temporary drop zone than a lasting system of order. On a slate board behind his desk chair, formulas and thoughts are written down in white chalk. A brilliant mind simply needs creative chaos to function – that is a common assumption. A study by a psychologist at the University Of Minnesota would support this theory. Unfortunately, many bosses often see it very differently and like to view the state of a desk as a calling card for an employee. Their theory that chronic workplace mess-makers are disorganised, sloppy and generally rather weak in character is also supported by studies. The truth probably lies somewhere in between.
- One theory: creativity springs from chaos
- The other theory: mess reduces productivity
- And the middle ground? Hard to keep in order!
One theory: creativity springs from chaos
There are plenty of examples supporting the idea that creative minds also thrive in, let’s say, a creative working environment. One photo showing Apple mastermind Steve Jobs at his home workspace bears a striking resemblance to Einstein’s desk – except for a huge iMac in front of him instead of a blackboard behind him. Even the bookshelves on the back wall are “organised” according to Einstein’s filing model. The US “Daily Show” mastermind, comedian, actor, writer and director Jon Stewart, clearly likes things wild and colourful: a notebook in the middle, a desktop computer to his left, and various items such as a sweet jar, construction helmet, soap dispenser and drinks can resting on wildly stacked piles of paper. Karl Lagerfeld’s setup is colourful too – but also highly structured. Brightly coloured fabric samples are stacked metres high, meticulously divided into piles of equal height on a clearly organised shelving unit.
Of course, there are also counterexamples: John Lennon, for instance, apparently needed no more for his work than the corner of a table – holding a pad, a pen and a glass of wine. The guitar case in the background, together with a floor lamp, a chair and an amplifier, creates an overall calm composition that could serve as a model for a still life – while his wife Yoko Ono, true to the artist cliché, fills an entire side of the table with notepads, books and scraps of paper.
If a study by a professor at the University Of Minnesota is to be believed, it is not only people’s workspaces that are as different as their owners. Kathleen Vohs set out to prove that complete disorder can even fuel the mind. The psychologist invited a group of participants to take part in an experiment and asked them to come up with uses for table tennis balls outside of sport. She sent one half of the participants into a spotless, neatly organised office and the other into a rather messy one. The result was clear: while both groups came up with roughly the same number of ideas, those from the chaos office were considerably more original. Through this and further experiments, the researcher came to the conclusion that a tidy environment tends to lead to traditional output, while a messy environment tends to produce unconventional or less conventional work.
The reason for this is apparently a psychological phenomenon: people generally strive for order. If there is no time to create order because other tasks take priority, or if the mess is simply too great, the brain switches gears and looks for the shortest solution. In short: thoughts take the shortest route too – but the chaotic environment inspires them to choose unusual paths.
The other theory: Messiness hampers productivity
However, Kathleen Vohs’ studies also revealed another insight. Further studies found that messy workers are stingier than tidy ones and often eat less healthily than their order-loving colleagues. Of course, that plays into the hands of those who have always suspected that a messy working environment is merely one symptom of many of a weak character. This rule of thumb remains especially persistent among managers, often followed by statements such as: “…and besides, a messy person spends more time searching than working.” That too appears to hold some truth, as a study by the Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Engineering and Automation shows.
His investigations revealed that chaos in the workplace really does cost a lot of working time. The official explanation will come as no surprise: more time is spent searching for things at messy desks, and dealing with missing or unnecessary work materials, than at tidy ones. Incidentally, the same also applies to a chaotic file storage system on your computer. What is remarkable, however, is the amount of working time wasted in this way: on average, around 70 working days a year are lost to searching at untidy desks – the institute calculates this as 10 percent of total working time.
Somewhere in the middle? Hard to say!
The truth probably lies somewhere in the middle. Of course, not every colleague sitting behind a disorderly mountain of loose papers and thousands of Post-its is a creative genius – and on the other hand, even the tidiest workplace can be occupied by someone who is extremely unmotivated and inefficient. But one thing is also clear: anything can be taken too far. If the clutter becomes so severe that it hinders workflow, then even the most die-hard desk chaos fan has to tidy up. And on the other side, the organisation fanatic should not spend more time on desk order than on the work itself. According to the experts, the ideal solution is a regularly scheduled, concerted big clear-out that frees up both your desk and your mind.
Expert tip: Declutter your desk
Get off to a focused start!
To give yourself the best chance of working as effectively and without interruption as possible, your desk should be as clear as possible. Only keep the things here that you really need and want to deal with soon.
Things that have been lying there unnoticed for years can safely be thrown away. Items you need more often should be kept within easy reach.