Mental Organization

Common interview questions are: “How do you stay organized?”, “Are you experienced with multitasking?”, and “How do you manage your time?”.

Within any industry, employers desire highly versatile and efficient workers. An employee who can adapt into any role is valuable, since unexpected issues happen all the time. Managers want to depend on their direct reports to handle these new responsibilities as they occur.

Setting an Agenda

Students develop multitasking skills during school, since they're usually enrolled in five classes at a time. During middle school, I had a binder for each class but a common agenda notebook. At the end of each class, the teachers would write down on the board the assigned homework for the day. When I got home, I could review the assignments for each class at a single location, rather than having to check every binder.

Fast-forward 10 years and I started my first full-time position in my Engineering career. In the beginning, I’d use a notebook to hand-write notes during my meetings. Eventually, it was difficult to organize the notes since the progress of each project were not chronological.

I got tired of carrying the notebook around and starting taking notes on my laptop (it was quite silly not to since I was carrying my laptop around anyways). I started creating Word files for each project or meeting, but it also became difficult to manage them all. The Word files became very long and messy. I hadn’t developed a good system for storing the documents, so finding a specific file took longer than needed.

It was a definite improvement over handwritten notes, so I kept this up until a coworker suggested a program I hadn’t heard of: OneNote.

OneNote to rule them all

Microsoft OneNote is a program designed to replicate handwritten notes. Fundamentally, it’s just a text editor, but it has many useful features:

• Auto-saves on Microsoft OneDrive, so it’s accessible from different devices
• Tabs and pages for different projects, so it’s easy to flip between different projects without having to find the file or manage multiple Word files at once
• Easily create text windows or paste images anywhere on the canvas
• Creates checklists for tracking open actions

My Strategy

I have the following tabs in my OneNote:

1. Main tab
1. Open Actions 
2. Work Completed
2. Active Project 1
3. Active Project 2
4. Completed Projects

Step 1: Plan

The “Main” tab is what I use for tracking “Open Items” and their due dates. Whenever I’m assigned a new task, I’ll add it to the list.

• Open Actions
  • Cook chili verde (due xx)
  • Write blog post (due xx)
  • Complete coding function x (due xx)

At the start of the workday, I’ll plan my day in the “Work Completed” list. These are all the action items that I wish to progress or complete by the end of the workday. I try to keep the goals realistic, and related to the priority of the “Open Actions” list. I also have to account for meetings, since they take a lot of time from the workday.

• Week #22:
  • May 30th, 2020
    • Cook chili verde
    • Write a blog post
    • Code function

Step 2: Execute

The workday is spent following my agenda. But there usually is some sort of distraction or disruption that was unexpected and consumes my time and focus. I’ll add these actions to the list, since they contribute towards missing my agenda.

• Work Completed
• Week #22:
  • May 30th, 2020
    • Cook chili verde
    • Pet cat
    • Play games
    • Write a blog post
    • Code function

Each project will have its own OneNote tab for storing notes, checklists, and written drafts.

Step 3: Review

At the end of the workday, I review my agenda one last time to review my completed actions. For each completed task, I’ll remove them from the “Open Action” list.

• Open Items
  • Cook chili verde (due xx)
  • Write blog post (due xx)
  • Complete coding function x (due xx)

If I haven’t completed an action, I’ll have to delete it from the “Actions Completed”, and it’ll remain on the “Open Action” list for the next day.

• Work Completed
• Week #22:
  • May 30th, 2020
    • Cook chili verde
    • Pet cat
    • Play games
    • Write a blog post
    • Code function

I’ve found it easy to remain diligent with this personal management process. It was already a necessity to organize these tasks, but it’s also quite satisfying to review all the actions I’ve completed in the past. By keeping the list update, I’ve created a lengthy backlog documenting my achievements and impacting actions.

Memory of these actions would be lost if I just depended on our memory. I couldn't remember what I ate for dinner 5 days ago, but I definitely ate something. These things just get lost over time, so having the information neatly documented helps recollection. 

Conclusion

An organized, well-maintained list of tasks is useful for both the present and the future. For the present, it helps us set goals and focus to complete realistic actions. For the future, it will help us reflect and appreciate the work completed in the past.

OneNote has been a great tool for maintaining a list like this. Workdays seem so long, yet the workweek flies by so quickly. Time escapes and deadlines creep sooner than expected. By planning and documenting my actions completed, I can stay on-time for my deliverables, or cite when issues were addressed.