Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Organising your notebook

This is my colleague's notebook that I've been threatening to blog about for months.

I love the way she organises her notes - hopefully this will work for some of you too.

  • She uses yellow post-it flags to highlight pages where there are still outstanding actions. This means she doesn't have to page through the whole notebook to find her place.
  • She also writes the client/ product name on those flags to help keep her place.
  • When she has a list of personal to-dos, she folds the page in half to help categorise those tasks separately. Can you see the page on the left is folded over?


I like to start a new page for each client meeting and for each day's work.

Of course I always use a spiral-bound notebook!

I write down my action items either in the meeting, or at my desk as I take calls or think of things to do. When I've done them, I highlight them in pink so I can still read them but they don't "bother" me anymore.

I don't use my work notebook for personal things unless they have to be done on that particular day, e.g. paying the doctor before I go to my appointments

How do you organise your notebook?
post signature

6 comments:

Cammy@TippyToeDiet said...

I do something similar in my "notes" notebook, only I use post-it notes, rather than flags. I like the note-size markers because I can write add'l keywords and such on those. I have a smaller, purse-sized notebook for my daily do's. It works for me fairly well, for now.

Kin said...

I only have one notebook - otherwise I would need one for the family, one for work, one for Lions etc. I find it simpler to keep it all contained.

Each day gets a new page, I rewrite any to do's forward as they come up and if they don't get done I carry them forward again.

I can see the use of tabs - I could probably incorporate those, but what I have seems to work. I can find anything by date, and my todo lists are updated and rewritten daily and because I cross things off I can see at a glance what hasn't been done. I keep notes of all phone calls in there, and I have a stack of full notebooks in a box. An A5 100 page notebook lasts me 2-3 months

Marcia Francois said...

I really should take a pic of the divider notebooks as they're such a fabulous idea if you like one notebook for all.

Cammy, I also like post-it notes, the brighter, the better :)

Kin, HELLO!!!!

I like that system of yours too and don't you find if you keep rewriting the same to-dos, either they get scrapped, you just DO them or they start seeming less important?

Kin said...

HELLO! Yes, it seems like I'm back. For now.

That's it, if it's not getting done for 2-3 days it does mean you need to reassess it.

I've tried so many other systems, including calendars and diaries and tabs etc, but this really does work for me. Except when I move house and leave it at my in-laws 1200km away for 6 weeks while I keep wondering why I can't stay on top of anything.

Since I got it back a week ago things have improved out of sight, now I have my "baby" back with me, and yes, it lives in my handbag when we go out, or on my desk at home.

Marcia Francois said...

Kin, love how you said "your baby" - it's so true when you find a system you like, it does become totally you.

I'm The Queen of My Castle said...

I'd love to use a notebook, but, I cannot find one the size of a planner to fit in my purse, which is how it would work best for me.

ShareThis