How I stay organised.

There has recently been lots of discussion on LinkedIn and Twitter about how to stay organised. I suspect it is because of the perfect storm that September brings: a new and busy term; new students; new modules and, possibly, new stationery.

Some people buy new clothes in September or a new pencil case. As I’m conscious of the environment and try to lead a fairly uncluttered existence (apart from my books, which is a different story – pun not intended), the only new item I purchase is a Leuchtterm 1917 dotted hardback journal* in a bright colour. This year’s is yellow.

I used to be all about the tech. I still am to some extent (I have a hybrid approach) but then I discovered the Bullet Journal. I’ve been using this method for about four years now since I returned to work after my first maternity leave. I don’t know if this was a coincidence or I just felt the need to physically write more.

The process: 

I started with an old Moleskine* I’d picked up from a conference to try out the method. You don’t need to go out and buy something new – I suspect many of you have many, many notebooks lying around. I’ve tried various habit trackers and layouts and have decided that simple is best. No beautiful, intricate drawings of weather formations for me sadly. Purely utilitarian with the occasional hint of washi tape when I’m feeling fancy. I think that’s why I like the bright colours as a compromise.

My notebook contains:

• A contents list 
• A future log (a layout of the 12 calendar months across two pages) 
• Numbered pages (Moleskine didn’t have these and there is no way I am going to number all the pages)

Each month has: 

• A gratitude list – I list one thing I’m grateful for each day (proven to improve happiness) 
• An overarching big to-do list
• A week plan which I create every Friday afternoon
• An end of month reflection where I ask myself questions such as – what was the most memorable part of this month, what were the three biggest lessons, how am I different this month compared to last, what am I grateful for and three things to improve (these questions were taken from the Passion Planner* pdf)

Each week has: 

• My overarching roles and goals so I can ensure I do something, no matter how small, towards them each week (this idea was taken from Stephen Covey’s 7 habits of effective people*) 
• My meetings transferred from Outlook 
• The tasks I want to work on 
• My favourite thing this week (this definitely helps when I think I’ve had a rubbish week)

At the end of the week, I will review it and plan the next one. I won’t plan any further than that if I can help it. Although recurring appointments do go in my Outlook. Longer term plans go on a separate page or in the Future Log. I use pages as I go along to take notes in meetings or collect ideas around a particular topic and make sure I log them all in the contents page. That’s what I like about the bullet journal – it’s so much more flexible and personal than any other type.





Some other organisation tools I use:

Evernote (I’ve gone down to the basic option now I use my bullet journal).
I use this to draft blog posts and capture the odd random thought that I have when I don’t have my bullet journal with me

Twitter Likes/Favourites 

If I see something I might come back to then I will ‘like’ it. It will be sent by IFTTT to Evernote where I will go through them periodically and categorise them.

Feedly

I’m signed up to blog posts on education, yoga, coaching and smallholding and can catch up with most of the posts in one place. As more people move towards sending newsletters this has become trickier and I find I am using it less.

LinkedIn and Facebook saved articles

I occasionally see something here and save it but often forget about it. Luckily it will often pop up somewhere else too!

iPhone calendar

I’ve just set up a shared calendar with my husband now that my eldest has started school. This lets us share when appointments are happening, when I am working from home so I can pick him up or vice versa, and general events happening. It means we don’t need to talk to each other as much. Just kidding, sort of!


Dropbox

This is great for when I’m working from home. It also means that when the laptop dies everything is still available from whatever device I am using. It’s also been useful in the past for sharing documents but I don’t need to do this very often now.

Trello

Inspired by Cathy Mazak, the Academic Writing Coach, I have started to log my Performance Development goals as projects. I hope to use it to help me write more too. I’ll let you know how it goes.

This currently works for me. When or if it stops I will gravitate towards something else. Just because something works for one person doesn't mean it will necessarily work for you but there's no harm in giving it a go.

How do you stay organised?

*affiliate link to keep me in chocolate and to see if this whole coaching academics and writing about it might bring new opportunities. I only recommend what I use and like.