With the change of season, you may be thinking about giving your office a thorough spring cleaning. After all, it is a time of renewal, so why not refresh your workspace?

Although you can dig right into sorting your belongings, information, and other “stuff” around your desk and your office, it’s helpful to start with a strategy around how you’re going to store and organize whatever remains. Increasingly, the people I work with are looking to centralize and streamline as much as possible — and one of the ways they’re able to achieve that goal is by using Evernote to facilitate the process.

Here are some of my favorite ways to use Evernote as part of your office spring-cleaning strategy:

So long, sticky-note monitor frame

Is your desk littered with sticky notes and scraps of scribbled paper? While it can be helpful to be able to jot down a quick note, it’s difficult to keep track of all those bits of paper as they accumulate, and even harder to find the information you need from them quickly. On top of that, sticky notes aren’t the most aesthetically pleasing decor choice for your desk.

Evernote can clean up your sticky note mess quickly and effectively. On your phone, use Evernote to take snapshots of your handwritten notes — one Evernote note per sticky or random scrap of paper. Put them in a notebook called “Sticky Notes” or something along those lines (or you can create a “Sticky Notes” tag if you prefer tagging). Evernote will make your handwritten notes searchable, so you’ll be able to find the information you’re looking for in a snap. As an added bonus, you’ll never have to worry about losing one of those notes again — they’ll all be in your Evernote account.

Clean up the idea pile

Regardless of what your job is, you probably come across articles that spark ideas, blog posts that you could riff off of in your work, and webpages that inspire your own creativity. These pieces are helpful to have handy as you develop your thinking around a project — after all, few ideas are created out of whole cloth. But when they’re kept in printed stacks or piles on our around your desk or buried in bookmarks on your computer, they not only create clutter — they’re impossible to use effectively.

Since Evernote can capture many different types of notes — Web Clips (via the Web Clipper), photos, scanned articles that you’ve torn out of a magazine, etc., it’s an ideal spot to keep the things that can spark your work-related ideas. Create an “Ideas and Inspiration” notebook, and corral the websites, articles, and notes that you’ve been collecting. When it’s time to work on a new project, set aside a few minutes to flip through the ideas you’ve collected. Looking through your notebook may just cause inspiration to strike!

Say goodbye to the “someday” stuff

Joshua Zerkel, Evernote Productivity Ambassador

It’s easy to jettison printed documents, articles, and other information that you only need for a limited time. But what about the content you’re less sure about — that article that you think may come in handy in the future, or the website that you might want to revisit?

This is a good time to bring Evernote into the mix. Rather than creating a “miscellaneous” folder or pile on your desk or computer,  create a “Someday” or “Articles” notebook in Evernote. Capture the web pages or scan the clips that you can foresee yourself needing access to, and store them in that new notebook. You’ll be able to easily search for that content when you need it, and in the meantime, it’s out of your way so you can focus on your work.

Follow Along on the Blog & Connect with Us

Want more great spring tips from Evernote? Follow along with Spring Made Simple by searching for the tag Spring Made Simple on the blog. Each week, we’ll be adding a number of special tips to kick your spring cleaning into high gear from our Ambassadors, delicious and easy Evernote Food recipes from notable chefs and restaurateurs, and tons more! You won’t want to miss out.

Do you have any great spring tips, ideas and recipes to share? Post your favorite spring cleaning tips, connect with others tackling new projects or just join the conversation on Twitter and Facebook. Follow @evernotelife and use the hashtag #evernotelife on Twitter throughout the spring season, and Like us on Facebook.

Don’t forget to check out Josh’s new e-book Evernote @ Work for more great ways to use Evernote in your office!

How have you used Evernote to “spring clean” your workspace? Share your top tips in the comments.

Professional organizers and productivity professionals get pretty excited about the organizational and productivity power that Evernote can offer, so at last week’s 2012 National Conference of the National Association of Professional Organizers (NAPO) in Baltimore, I hosted a meetup for my colleagues. I thought a few people would be interested — but we had almost 50 people attend!

At the meetup, I walked attendees through the brand-new Evernote productivity guide, and discussed a variety of strategies for using Evernote to stay productive and get the right things done. I loved hearing stories of how my colleagues in NAPO are sharing Evernote with their clients and how they are using it themselves in their own businesses.

Since Evernote partners Fujitsu (makers of the ScanSnap line of scanners that let you scan directly into Evernote) and the new FileThis Fetch service were both at the NAPO conference, I invited them to join me at the event. What’s great is that attendees were able to learn first-hand how using the Trunk (where you can find a variety of 3rd party apps and products that integrate with Evernote) can let Evernote do even more for you! Kim from Fujitsu generously gave away a ScanSnap scanner to one lucky winner, and several folks won Evernote Premium subscriptions. Score!

All told, it was a really fun event, and as always, it’s a real treat for me to get to share the Evernote love!

The Evernote Ambassador Program

Evernote Ambassadors are amazing individuals that are here to teach, share and help you get more out of Evernote. Learn more about Ambassadors and consider submitting your story.

Join the conversation happening in our Lifestyle Forum to connect with Ambassadors and other Evernote users.
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Download Other Ambassador Guides

Drap and drop them into a New Note or attach them to a note so you can access them from any computer or mobile device where you have Evernote installed!

Carley Knobloch Spring Cleaning Tips (PDF)
Brandie Kajino’s Organization Tips (PDF)