What’s the difference between home organizing and cleaning?
This is a question I get from clients a lot. And I think it’s an important one, because understanding what organizing really is (and isn’t) might make you think totally differently about how you manage your home.
Sometimes my clients will say things like “are you going to clean out my closet?” or tell me they feel embarrassed that “I’m an adult and I need help cleaning up my bedroom.”
When we think about organizing, many of us think back to our parents telling us to “clean up” our bedroom. That often meant to make the space more tidy — folding or hanging up clothes left on the floor, putting toys away, and making your bed. So it’s understandable that people might feel embarrassed when their home isn’t tidy or feels messy, because it’s something our parents might have taught us is a basic chore. But if you don’t understand why your space feels untidy in the first place, it will be hard to keep it tidy for long. And this is where the difference between organizing and cleaning comes in.
Here’s a quick list I made to show the differences between cleaning vs. organizing. These aren’t official definitions, but how I personally think about the differences:
Organizing
Creates systems to help clients use their belongings and space more effectively
Helps clients decide what to keep and what to let go of (declutter)
Makes a home tidier
Designs systems to help clients maintain an organized home
Cleaning
Removes dirt, dust, and grime from existing environment
Generally leaves existing belongings in the home
Makes a home tidier
Needs to be done routinely (no matter how clean a space is, dust and dirt will eventually build up again)
The biggest difference between organizing and cleaning is systems. Home organizers help clients create systems to store, display, and manage their belongings in a desirable way (often, clients want their homes to appear neater, but that’s not always the goal).
Here’s an example of how I might create a system for a client. Let’s say I’m working with someone who struggles with paper cluttering their kitchen — there are piles of mail and kids’ paperwork from school all over the countertops. Which means they can’t use their kitchen countertops and they also can’t find the papers they need when they need one. I would start by helping the client clear the papers off their counters (which some people might think of as “cleaning”), but then I would try to get to the root of the clutter. Maybe the client is afraid of getting rid of something important, so they keep every piece of mail that comes in. But then when papers pile up, they feel overwhelmed. Then, we would design a system together to keep the counters clutter-free and make sure they could find what we need. We might decide on “rules” about what’s important, such as deciding that all junk mail goes directly from the mailbox to the recycling bin outside the door. We might create a physical space for important papers, like a file or a bin, so the client can always feel confident they can find important paperwork.
Decluttering is another big difference. As an organizer, I spend a lot of time working with my clients to help them understand if they actually want or need all of the items in their homes (99% of the time, the answer is no). While I don’t tell my clients what to get rid of, I help them think through what they value most and whether their belongings are supporting those goals. From there, we work together to decide the best next step for items they no longer want or need, which could involve donating to a local charity, using a local exchange (like Buy Nothing groups), or selling the item.
Physical dirt and dust is something I generally do not deal with as a professional organizer. When I go to a client’s home, I may dust a shelf before I organize items on it, but I’m not going to vacuum the carpets or scrub the bathtub or wash the windows. These are important tasks, just not in the scope of my role as an organizer. However, many of my clients find that it’s easier to clean their home after they’ve decluttered — it’s easier to vacuum or dust when there’s less stuff in the way.
On the flip side, it’s difficult for a home that’s not organized to feel clean for long. If you have cleaners come over, yet your home feels “messy” again in a day or two, most likely you have a problem with organization, not cleaning.
What cleaning and organizing have in common is that they both make a home feel tidier. I think of organizing as the foundational layer that makes a home feel functional and neat, and cleaning as the outer layer that makes a home really sparkle and shine.
So ultimately, if you are struggling to keep your home “clean” or “tidy,” consider if you have good organizational systems in place. Is it easy to put your clothes away, or do you tend to just throw them on that chair because you don’t have a system that works for you? Thinking differently about when you need to organize and when you need to clean might help you make a breakthrough and feel better about your home.
