There’s magic in mess: Why you should embrace a disorderly desk(timharford.com)

  To most of us, it may seem obvious that piling is
  dysfunctional while filing is the act of a serious
  professional. Yet when researchers from the office
  design company Herman Miller looked at high-performing
  office workers, they found that they tended to be
  pilers. They let documents accumulate on their desks,
  used their physical presence as a reminder to do work,
  and relied on subtle cues — physical alignment, dog-
  ears, or a stray Post-it note — to orient themselves.