Organizing Tools for Nonprofit Professionals

eileenmariagarcia
Sep 17
2 min read

Over the last few years, nearly half of my coaching clients have disclosed an ADHD diagnosis or a challenge related to staying organized. While organizing isn't the central focus of my consulting work, this experience has led me to identify tools and strategies that promote focus in the workplace so that I can support clients in staying accountable to their professional goals.

Here are five of the ones that my clients seem to find most useful, regardless of whether they have an ADHD diagnosis:

Schedule out component parts of larger tasks. Rather than calendaring deadlines, block out on a calendar time for each component part of activities.
Consider using project management platforms to keep track of projects (individually or in collaboration with a team). The reminders and visual tracking can be super helpful, but note that some of the most widely used require a lot of upfront work & ongoing maintenance and weren’t a fit with some of my clients without set-up support. (I recently came across one specifically designed for people with ADHD and one of my clients is enamored with it.)
Use the Pomodoro Technique or similar structure of alternating designated focus time, and mini breaks, ultimately rewarded with a longer break
Give yourself “assignments” for meetings. While large group meetings can be ripe opportunities for distraction, predetermining a few things to listen for or ask can help in keeping focus on the content at hand.
Capture stray thoughts. Moments of inspiration/distracting thoughts during scheduled tasks can lead to constantly abandoning one task to chase down another. Jotting down these gems for attention later can help prevent losing momentum for the task at hand.