Hey! Welcome back to DarrenCrawford.com I’ve been searching for a few days for a simple way to integrate the features of Evernote with my GTD system. I stress simple because I don’t want a lot of clicks or shortcuts to make it work. I want to be able to empty my head in seconds and not lose my thought trying to figure out how to place it in my inbox. In the vein of “keep it as simple as possible, but no simpler”, this is what I’ve come up with:
The Phases of GTD: Collect > Process > Organize > Review > Do
COLLECT:
I have been using
Evernote as one of my capture tools recently. I set it up with 3 and only 3 Notebooks. Simple. My default is INBOX. This is where all my incoming notes, emails, photos etc go. This is my collection bucket and is completely unprocessed. I get this INBOX to zero daily most of the time.
PROCESS:
My 2nd Notebook is NEXT ACTIONS. As I process my INBOX I will tag the notes with the appropriate @CONTEXT. Currently I have settled on the following tags:
.PROJECTS = List of all my projects. This is a tickler or placeholder for the project and might contain some thoughts or mindmaps in the body.
@AGENDAS = Contains a note for each person I regularly need to discuss things with. In the body are the specific ticklers or items I want to talk with them next time I see them.
@ANYWHERE = Items that I can do anywhere. I don’t need a computer or phone or a specific person to accomplish these.
@CALLS = Specific calls that I need to make
@COMPUTER = Things I can only do while at a computer
@ERRANDS = Things I need to get while I am out and about, like supplies at Home Depot or Staples for example.
@HOME = Things I need to do at home like change the HVAC filter or clean the fish tank.
@READ/REVIEW = Items that I have clipped or emailed myself that I want to read at some point. Things might be articles from my Google Reader, a website or specific URL that I want to review later on
@WAITING FOR = I will clip or email myself tracking info for Amazon shipments etc.
@WORK = Things that I need to do at work. You never know when you might have an incredible idea about that certain project for that specific client while you are say running errands or just hanging out in a hammock.
Basically anything in my NEXT ACTIONS notebook are things that are undone and can be sorted by the CONTEXT that I am in.
ORGANIZE:
My 3rd and final notebook is REFERENCE. Not everything that ends in my INBOX is ACTIONABLE. Sometimes it is just something cool that I emailed myself or a PDF that I want ubiquitous access to (I’ve installed the desktop client on my work and home laptops, as well as my Blackberry Storm). Items in the reference folder are tagged with categories that succinctly summarizes it and makes it additionally easy to find.
My current tags are:
FAMILY/PERSONAL – includes things like copies of birth certificates etc
GOAL SETTING – documents and workbooks for my goals
GTD – articles and documents about PDF
HEALTH & FITNESS – articles about health, workout routines, etc
PICTURES – Pictures of things like whiteboard brainstorms
RECIPES - Recipes that I’ve seen on FOOD NETWORK or otherwise would like to try or try again.
SOMEDAY/MAYBE – the infamous Someday I might do this.
TRAVEL – Places I’d like to travel, or information about a specific place like RESTAURANTS TO CHECKOUT WHILE IN ALBUQUERQUE
REVIEW:
The Review phase is pretty simple from the desktop or web client. Simply click the context you are in and BLAMMO! there you have a list of things that you can do right now.
DO:
There is probably not a lot of DOING happening inside of Evernote, however, as part of this phase I determine if the action that I completed should be deleted or archived in the REFERENCE notebook. I will untag it from the @CONTEXT and tag it with one of the tags from the ORGANIZE phase. Honestly, most actions don’t get moved to REFERENCE. Some of the more complex projects that I would like to refer back to move to the REFERENCE notebook.
Finally…
A pair of tips that I have found very helpful. I love the ability to email stuff to my Evernote account. However, the unique email address that is assigned is too hard to remember. So I created another GMAIL account that looks like: evernote.myname@gmail.com and then created a filter to forward emails from my personal and work email addresses to the unique evernote address. It is then marked as read and moved to the archive. If somebody else were to email something to that inbox, it won’t get forwarded since the filter is only for my emails.
And for my multi-function printer, I pointed all scanned items to be saved in to the newly created directory: MY DOCUMENTS\EVERNOTE. I then took Evernote Windows Client and set that folder to automatically import to my INBOX. To do that: TOOLS > ACCOUNT PROPERTIES > FILE IMPORT and then point to your directory. It is also easy to DRAG ‘N DROP files in to that folder for quick and easy importing to Evernote.
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I’m not a GTD disciple but I always enjoy seeing the multitude of ways people are using Evernote. I have a very similar setup with few notebooks and tags to help organize. I think I’m going to “borrow with pride” your process for actions. This is very clear and well written. Thanks for taking the time!
@Jude – Thanks for the encouragement. I “researched” my setup from a David Allen article on setting up OUTLOOK 2007. I wanted the consistency between my work setup and my everyday life. I can’t find the link to the article, but if you would like it, @reply me on twitter or email me.
I’ve been using Evernote for GTD for about 8 months. I hadn’t heard of anyone else using it for this purpose until your post here. Good news to see another person realize the GTD potential of Evernote.
BTW, I’ve been using an almost identical approach, except my REFERENCE folder is broken into three contextual folders for my work, school, and freelancing.
Thanks for the article.
@Scott – I listened to the evernote podcast the other day about GTD. Podcast #2. They talked about making it even more GTD-friendly which would be great.
I’ve been using evernote in a fairly limited way but have also been thinking about restarting my stalled GTD effort. I might try some of your ideas.
I’m not sure about the need for the extra email address though. Surely just adding the evernote address as a contact with a simple nickname would be ok.
@jonathan – I agree on setting it up as a contact. I have it setup that way on my Blackberry. But there were times I would be on a site and click the EMAIL ME THIS! button and would have to go find the evernote email address because I wasn’t sending it from my Outlook or Gmail. For me it is all about making it as simple as possible and not thinking too much.
Nice description of your GTD! I’ve been working with Evernote for a little while, but still haven’t got to grips with how to fit it in with my current system. This has really helped! Thanks!
with gmail you can send things to username+tag@gmail.com and it will go to the username@gmail.com inbox. You can then use filtering to send that email onto evernote or wherever based on which tag you use. That saves signing up for a new address.
Karen, this is a great tip. I learned something new today.
Excellent Post! Super simple…thanks for sharing your set up. I have been using EN & GTD for a while myself. If you're interested, you can check it out here –> http://chanceandcary.blogspot.com/2008/11/evernot...
I'm pretty new to GTD and I've spent a lot of time looking at how others implement their system in order to figure out what will work best for me. I've seen other GTD implementations in Evernote (http://is.gd/1GD5H and http://is.gd/1GD3V) but I keep coming back to the lack of calendar integration and alerts. I'd really like to be able to use one piece of software to manage my scheduled as well as my unscheduled actions. How do you address this issue?
Colin, I tend to use Calendars for 3 distinct purposes:
1) Hard landscape events such as telephone conference calls, meetings etc.
2) Tasks that HAVE to be done today (ie: submit my expense report by 4pm today). These I set with an earlier reminder and usually set them time as FREE (in my Outlook Calendar).
3) Reminders of things or events going on (ie: wife has doctors appointment tomorrow, or a specific VIP is in town)
As far as a Calendar in Evernote, truthfully this has not been too much of an issue for me since I spend most of my day in front of Outlook at work. Events that I want to remember on my "personal calendar" I will usually email myself and accept the invite on my blackberry.
Evernote is really just my mobile, electronic capture tool. It is easier for me (and more environmentally-friendly) to email my evernote inbox a google reader story, action item (more personal than work-related) or snap a photo of something than to print it out.
I am still a fan of junior legal size notepads that I have with me at all times to jot down a discrete action or reminder item that gets tossed into my physical inbox either at work or at home. But those items eventually make it into either Outlook (for work) or Evernote for personal. I have Outlook at home, but prefer not to use it for email since it is too slow to open ad hoc.
Let me know if you have any more questions or if I can help in anyway. And thanks for the comment!
I've been using Evernote for about 2 months now. I hava imiplemented a bit of GTD with a few of my own ideas.
http://csandoval.posterous.com/evernote-and-gtd
* I only have two notebooks. That's it! Every note is always placed in my Inbox. At certain intervals thgoughout the day I attach tags to those notes and move the note to the Processed notebook.
* The key in my system is tags. As you can see from the image, each tag is prefixed with a special character: this helps me read the tags better when I am looking at a note's tags like: @computer, !high, .household (this is telling me that it is a high priority item that I should do when Im in the computer and it has to do with my household)
* the #notes tag is given for notes (or reference items).
* in the #ticker_* notes I keep all my recurring tasks
Right – I have a similar setup, but I use 14 different notebooks for GTD. Some of the separation you use tags for, I have separated by notebook. Have been running my GTD setup in Evernote since the beta-program, it works just wonderfully for the way I've implemented it.
peace,
Tormod
Thanks for sharing. I’ve been a huge fan of Both Evernote and GTD for a while now. I tried integrating the two but didn’t find it very effective for me at least. I liked your implementation though. For me there is no comparison to the ‘Things’ app for mac (and iPhone). Built explicitly for GTD, I love it. There’s a free demo if you’ve got a mac. I use Evernote for capture (Evernote iPhone rocks) and for my journal, things I learn throughout the day about code or design, recipes, and general notes. Thanks again for the post.
Yep, sadly there isnt a client for windows. When they make such one, Things will truly be an awsome tool.
Anybody tried to make a tickler file system in evernote?
Great tips – thanks for sharing your tags – I found that very helpful. Hey, is there a way to set a reminder to an Evernote note (like a due date alarm)? Seems like that functionality should be there, but I can't find it . . . .
Scott, no reminders. But I've heard about some changes to Evernote coming either directly from the Evernote team or from other people developing off their API.
Very nice tips- I have fun with Evernote & GTD .Thank for sharing.
Wow, thanks for this! I've been following GTD and using Evernote separately for a while now, and I've always felt there should be a way to integrate them…and it looks like you're definitely onto something here…
I'd like to implement this myself, but could you give me some clarification on how you handle projects? Specifically, how do you associate a project's Next Action with the project itself?
For instance, if you have a project of "Fix garage" with the next action "Buy Nails", would you put "buy nails" inside the "fix garage" note, or let it be it's own note tagged with "Fix garage"…or something else?
thanks again for the inspiration!
I might do two things… if I was setting up the project note and knew of some upcoming next actions, i might put that in the message body just as a tickler. If I knew the very next thing I needed as BUY NAILS then I would add that as a note and tag it as @ERRANDS.
Basically, the message body is going to house some kind of actions that would be associated with the project, maybe not necessarily all next actions. Some of them could be two, three, four steps down the line.
I wouldn't over-complicate things. Your brain is going to connect the dots, if you leave enough of a trail. For instance, I would probably title it:
HOME DEPOT: Buy 1/4" Nails for broken garage door
tag it @ERRANDS and then a week from now during my Weekly Review I will see it and remember exactly what it was for. I won't scratch my head and say "BUY NAILS"? What for? What size? What was I thinking!?
Hope that helps! And thanks for the comments.
For implementing GTD you can use this web-based application:
http://www.Gtdagenda.com
You can use it to manage your goals, projects and tasks, set next actions and contexts, use checklists, schedules and a calendar.
A mobile version is available too.
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darrencrawford.com – cool!!!!
iv been using evernote and GTD for a few months now. my approach is slightly different in that I capture to a "to be processed" notebook. then, at least during my weekly review, the notes get processed accordingly, whether they be for reference only (move to a reference notebook and tagged appropriately), or added to tickler or next actions list in outlook and then deleted from evernote (unless there is some inherant value, then they get moved to Reference).
essentially its a compliment to my system and I capture using a win mobile device (mainly text and audio) and the browser plugin..
great post
Thanks for post. Nice to see such good ideas.
This really helped me retool my system today. Great post!
Great post – I'm a big fan of Evernote, and a tried and true GTD failure
I'm hoping that this will help me get a bit more organized with my … stuff. Thanks again for the post!
Nice post! It's always great to see how many different implementations of GTD you can impart onto the Evernote system. It's the sign of a truly flexible system when there are so many variations. I really like your ideas around the Windows import folder, that seems really useful. I may have to find a way to work it into what I've been doing…
I have been using a setup that's similar to yours, but has some differences as well. More than anything I put everything in one Notebook. I've found that keeping separate notebooks tends to restrict my searches and hampers my ability to find things. Check it out if you're interested, you can see it here:
http://examinehealth.com/personal-productivity/69...
Nice post, wow 35 comments how did you manage that???
Instead of creating a new gmail account, dont forget that you can add an "+evernote" to your existing one. if your email is yourname@gmail.com, then any word you add after the plus sign still goes to yourname@gmail.com. So you can send an email to yourname+note@gmail.com and it will still go to yourname@gmail.com.
So in Gmail, set up a rule that anything sent to yourname+note@gmail.com is forwarded to that hard-to-remember evernote email. Then from now one send your evernote email to yourname+note@gmail.com. To make it even better, set the rule to also label anything sent to yourname+note@gmail.com as "Evernote Backup". Now everything in evernote has a backup.
Have fun!
i'm intrigued and a wee bit excited. have set my system up the same as yours initially.
on my gmail account i simply entered my evernote address in contacts as x evernote. no-one else's name starts with an x so it makes email evernote quicker
This is great. I was wondering if you can explain the tagging? … not sure what the @ represents versus the (.) or as I see in other posts, someone used the ! in front of the tags?… is there a reference guide that I'm missing. Just signed up for Evernote today, this post is great. Very helpful. Thanks, ~ Mike
Hi Mike – I use the @ symbol in front for a sorting tool. Evernote will sort special symbols ahead of alphanumeric characters. I have used the '.' to push PROJECTS to the top of the list. If I had used @PROJECTS it would've sorted it to the middle of the other @tags and gotten "lost" amongst the other contexts.
@ symbolizes my context's or places that I am. @COMPUTER, @HOME etc… This allows me to search for action items based on "where I am". That way I won't be looking up @COMPUTER when I am at the store and need to be running @ERRANDS
Plus when you read it, it sounds like @COMPUTER is when I am "At Computer".
Hope that helps.
Dude, you rock! … totally get it now. This post is killer. Thanks a bunch! ~ Mike
I am new to GTD and Evernote, but have the book by David Allen. I am having trouble deciphering the simple symbols: the "." in .projects and the "@" in the tags. Thanks for this basic help.
Hi David – if you take a look at the earlier reply from 3 days ago that should help.
I currently am using a Evernote-GTD setup designed by Ruud Hein.
It costs 15 minutes to set up and works like a charm. You should take a look
http://ruudhein.com/evernote-gtd
Another Evernote GTDer!
Have setup something similar to yours and the only significant item I’ve added is a separate folder named “_completed”. Although I love EN, I find the tasks associated with multi-tag management annoying. As my folders and tags increased over time, the left column list has started to not permit seeing all the folders and tags I need without having to expand lists or scroll up/down the screen.
The ability to drag a completed task into the completed folder retains the original tag, and removes the item from the stuff I need to concentrate on … in one swift drag-and-drop operation.
Tags alone are good, but my workflow seems more aligned to capturing items with a common theme first, and then adding tags later. Sort of a digital veriosn of “Shoot first and ask questions later”.
Thanks for the great ideas,
W.
Certainly. Please let me know when you post – love to read it.