A PKM Odyssey Over Two Weekends

Hello friends,

One of the things I love to share in this newsletter is my tech explorations. Here’s an article I wrote but never published when I was exploring personal knowledge management.

A PKM Odyssey Over Two Weekends

I first came across the idea of knowledge management some years ago when writing for a company that specialised in it. Back then, it was all about knowledge management for business - having a single source of truth - SSOT - so that everyone in a company knew where to find the most up to date and reliable information about anything.

I saw that in practice when I worked part time for a remote company and, though we didn't call it that, in more recent roles. Since we worked remotely with people around the globe and wanted people to be able to pull info as needed - a search first culture - we had to create the necessary documents and store them in the right place.

But I hadn't seriously considered knowledge management for myself. Which I arguably should have. As someone who's been online for a long time and doing a job that required a lot of research at regular intervals, keeping track of both my research and my own published work has been an issue I've been trying to solve for a long time, with limited success.

Trying Knowledge Management Solutions

Bookmarks - remember those? - didn't quite cut it, and I started with a bunch of tools meant to let you get the most from those. As browsers got better that need declined, as these days I can simply search for what I want. I tried Google Reader, then Feedly, then Pocket - you name it. Since I used to review web apps as part of my freelance remit, I had a lot to choose from. Not a single one really did the job.

Then FLOWLab founder Em Weltman introduced me to Heyday, an app that automatically keeps track of your browsing history in a useful way. And then I found Omnivore to serve as my read it later app. Because it allows me to highlight and make notes, it's also made the process of putting together my monthly reading list much easier. Sadly, both of those apps are disappearing after being acquired by other companies.

Another frustration I had was waiting for Scrivener, which I used for managing my writing, to get an Android app. I got tired of having to put stuff in Google Keep and then move it manually, of having things in a bunch of different places and never knowing where anything was. The knowledge that had to be organised kept increasing, and the solutions for managing it got more elusive, it seemed.

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Using Notejoy; Exploring Organisation Systems

But then another FlowLab conversation got me excited about Bear right up till I discovered it wasn't on Android. That's when Linda Berberich recommended Notejoy. It was free to try so I tried it but soon blew through the five free notebooks. So I upgraded to the super reasonable Solo plan, and spent a happy weekend moving everything out of Scrivener manually and Google Keep via an import.

But there was just one thing I still needed: a system I could use across all digital platforms so I'd always know where everything was. I spent a week reading voraciously about PKM systems. There were a LOT to look at:

• Zettelkasten - with slips and cards like an old library filing tray.

• Johnny Decimal, like Dewey Decimal kinda though I really didn't see how the numbers would help me as that's not how I think.

• GTD which I'd tried physically when I still used filing trays and ultimately abandoned.

• And finally PARA the system that eventually became the backbone of my own approach.

Rolling My Own Folder System

After looking at PARA in some detail, I came up with my own folder hierarchy: PILA - Projects, Interests, Life, Archived, with an optional In-Tray on some platforms. I went old school with the name because I didn't want to fall foul of any other app using an inbox.

I created the same folder system on Notejoy, Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive and Windows (which is tightly integrated with OneDrive anyway). I had an in tray on Notejoy which is where new notes went. And also on Google Drive for documents I copied.

This felt simple and flexible. My aim was to have most written stuff in Notejoy, moving to other apps only when needed, so it could become my SSOT.

After getting to this stage the question arose of whether I really needed all of those apps. After reviewing things I concluded that I had to keep OneDrive as it was integrated with Windows and our Office365 Family plan. And the same applied to Google Drive. So Dropbox was the one that had to go, even though it was my favourite.

How do you organise your life and work?

Update: I'd planned to share this article for a while, but believe it or not, after six months as a happy and organised Notejoy user, I've just been introduced to a shiny new tool called TickTick. Look out for my update on that soon.

Thanks for reading,

Sharon