You might be amazed to learn how many professional organizers are fans of 43folders. I have been one for ages, which is why I feel shocked and stung by your mash-up of misconceptions on this subject!

A professional organizer is someone who transfers organizing skills to a client. After the client has identified a goal, the first and most important organizing skill is learning to get rid of the unnecessary. The first skill plus one is learning to turn off the tap, so that useless junk doesn’t come into the person’s life in the first place. You and all of professional organizing are in agreement on the need for a profound realignment in thinking.

Not all organizers work with the chronically disorganized (some of whom are hoarders, some of whom have OCD) and not all work with closets. But the principle of improving lives by transferring organizing skills spans all the various specialties.

As a professional organizer who specializes in helping business owners and work teams to organize their time, paper and projects, I don’t see many closets. I do sometimes see in-boxes clogged with 6,000 messages, schedules larded with useless activities, and drawers crammed with ancient papers. More often I see pretty organized and effective people who want to get even more organized, because they value the ways in which improved organization can help them achieve their most important goals in work and in life.

I admit I personally geek out at the Container Store, but I seldom send a client there, because organization doesn’t come in a box. It’s about habits, not gadgets.