While driving to work this morning I passed a nice looking bench with a matching trash can next to it along the side walk. This wasn't at a place of business, or even a park. It was simply a public bench and trash can.
My first thought was "I wonder who empties that trash can?". Then I thought, "it's probably the same entity that would be picking up any trash along the road."
Then it occurred to me, a trash can is not an ideal solution, it's a necessary solution. The most ideal solution would be for everyone to throw their garbage directly into the landfill. This, however, is not realistic. As a result, we have services, and government funded entities created, as a provision, to fill the void and to ensure that all of our waste ends up in the right place.
If you have children, you know what it is like to constantly be collecting garbage from the ground around your house, in your car, under furniture. It becomes a mission to teach your toddler to put all of their garbage into the trash can, any trash can, and you provide a lot of them. This is not because anyone finds it ideal to have to empty multiple little trash cans from every room and bathroom around your house on a weekly, or possibly daily basis, however it is far easier than collecting trash from every last spot your toddler decided to drop them.
This same concept applies to your work within your organization. If you find you are constantly having to hunt for information, or your inbox is filled with little bits of it in varying formats and degrees of importance, create a "trash can". Your organization needs designated drop locations for important things. The great thing is you can sub-divide this however you need. Just like having a trash can, next to a recycle bin, you can create multiple drop locations.
Once you do this, you will find that individuals in your organization will appreciate the structure and knowing they have a defined path to what they seek, as well as a place to return to for updates and additional information. You will find it streamlines your workflow in triaging all of this information and putting it to work.
Now these can take many forms, from a literal "inbox" on a desk, to a form tied to a spreadsheet, or a shared email address. Anyway you do it, you must do four things for it to be successful.
Define it - you must define it's purpose and the workflow associated with it.
Name it - you must give it a name for everyone in your organization to call it.
Sell it - you must sell it's name and purpose to your organization and get their buy in.
Use it - you must set the example and use it accordingly, and not work around it.
With these four steps, you can implement any number of solutions to streamline the processes in your organization.