Guest Author - Sharlene Thomas

Typewriters, computers, iPods, PalmPilots, work organizers, all record-keeping tools of today's high-tech office, can't hold a candle to a 19th-century leader -- the index card. The size may vary (3x5, 4x6, 5x8) but it's sheer efficiency that gives it its king-of-the-hill organizational prowess.

Index cards are now available in three sizes, lined or unlined, primary or pastel coloring for easy coding, loose or wire-bound. There are even attractive pouches available to carry a day's supply for quick notes.

Daytime organizer styles come and go, yet, the index card remains the best friend of the successful entrepreneur. Why is that? Perhaps the most obvious reason is fast retrieval of information. Last year's organizer rests in drawers or bookshelves, and, you have to know where the information was written, to locate it.

Combining Sizes for Efficiency and Storage

If your record-keeping requires one-time turn-around order sheets and invoices, combining 3x5 and 5x8 cards will save you tons of storage space over the years. Use the 3x5 card for customer data. Keep it in front of your alphabetized section as a tickler until the job is done. Use the 5x8 card for orders, changes, and archiving completed jobs. Attach copies of folded paperwork to back of card and/or envelope pockets for CDs or samples on the back.

Date everything from sign-up through every change to keep current. Archive older customers in a section behind the current ones. If they return years later, just move them forward.

Truth be told, your customers and the IRS don't care how you store your files; they care that you can access the information. The size of your storage system is your choice. Archived 5x8 boxes are genuine space savers.

My personal system is to combine the use of all three sizes of index cards. I carry 3x5 cards for note-taking and, let me assure you, they are not neat. In fact, most have doodles on them! At the office, I redo the information in a more permanent form onto a 4x6 card.

Why cards and not notebooks? I use both! The cards are easily categorized, while information tends to get lost in notebooks that are probably better suited for longer writing sessions.

You may choose to use the 3x5 cards for everything. I just happened to get a great deal on some old government 4x6 file drawer cabinets at $5 each and that set my standard. They are metal and easily repainted to match my changing office decor.

TIP: Create categories and use the upper right-hand corner of the card to jot down the date and category for that contact. Great memory-jogger for older customers!

Software History and a Bad Memory

Nothing is more frustrating and time-consuming than trying to locate user information for software and online sites not used or visited on a regular basis.

A Software section in your card file will keep it all at hand: date of purchase, support numbers, login name, user name, passwords, registration codes, and updates, making it so much easier to keep track of what you have on your computer, laptop, and handheld devices.

Especially irritating is trying to remember how to use revisited software. My 5x8 cards have these special instructions and their own place on the credenza.

Print the basic instructions, reduce them to the smallest readable font with your copier, and trim to fit and tape to the back of your card. Tape makes updating much easier.

Time is Money and Your Perks

Time spent looking for instructions and information is a drain on productivity, whether you are the owner or employee of a business. Your job generates the profit used to pay your wages and/or salary. If you're not producing, you're reducing -- potential raises, bonuses, and benefits.

Asking another employee to help you is a double-plus loss of productivity. How? If you make $10 an hour and your coworker $11.50, that's a $21.50 hourly loss running down information. Actually, that's $21.50 an hour PLUS approximately 31% more for employer payroll costs.

Imagine the savings, multiplied by the number of info-search posses formed, if you had taken the time (what, five minutes?) to put it all on a 5x8 card for the next time you needed to work with that software.

Computer crashes, files deleted by mistake, and personnel changes, happen fast. There is little time to save or pass on vital instructions and information. We still can't be sure our digital records will be around centuries from now, but we do know handwritten notes have passed the test of time.

Index cards are your CYA Journal's best friend, and yours. Does your office have an index card file system in place? Great. Embrace it. Add a software section, if it's missing. For those of you just starting out, you have the exquisite joy of creating your own system, your own best friend, for your whole business career.