The benefits of doing this are obvious. It not only allows us to deal with new events and things more efficiently, but also allows us to find them more conveniently and quickly when we need them. There is no need to force our brains to remember them. When habits are formed, these things will come naturally, which will undoubtedly make us get twice the result with half the effort.
The following is the translation:
Many people think that organization is a personality trait. For example, truly organized people can force them to organize folders through their special brain pathways, and they have extraordinary memories of deadlines and to-do lists. This statement is not true. Being organized is actually a skill, which can be acquired through learning.
If being organized is a personality trait, it's not something I was born with. My natural state is a mess, using the steps as shelves and boxes as folders. If I can learn from a sloppy person to be organized, I guess you can, too.
Organization is the synthesis of design and maintenance. If you have a well-designed organized system (scattered people don't), then you can keep everything in order without much effort. It is also necessary to maintain this system regularly, because even if it is a near-perfect method, there will be some events to disturb it.
Everyone can be organized, it's not natural. We need to design a set of our own methods to deal with everything in an orderly way, and we also need to check this method regularly to see if there is something wrong, or if something breaks some rules, improve it and make it continue to be robust.
Being organized only plays an auxiliary role in efficiency. I know many efficient people who never pay attention to organization. The real purpose of organization is to reduce the energy consumed by the brain for everything that needs to be tracked. If you have never had a methodical arrangement, then you need to remember everything with your brain. However, the brain is not always reliable.
Learning organization is in line with the idea that "the less trouble, the less stress". This means two aspects of orderliness:
Understand the pain points to be solved by organization, and then pay attention to how to design an organized system method.
No matter where you are, capture devices can help you record events, ideas, projects, tasks or notifications. Even if you wear shorts, you should have a capture device around you.
My capture devices are some record cards and a pen, which are in my pocket. When I have some new information to record, I will write it down. When I get home, I will re-record all the information on the cards into my complicated information storage system.
Capture devices can reduce your memory burden. At any time, you can write down the dates, requests or new to-do lists that are easy to forget and suddenly appear to help you not forget them.
Habit records are also a manifestation of respect. I respect those who write down my request immediately, instead of just saying "I'll give it to you later". The cost of record card is not high, so you don't need to buy expensive technical products to make records.
A good memory is not as good as a bad writing. It is better to write down things that need to be remembered when you are away or inconvenient, such as dates and events, or write them down in other ways. In this way, when you get home or have time, you can put it into your to-do system, so you don't have to put pressure on your brain, and you can also prevent forgetting important things.
The key to keeping organized is that everything needs a home, which is its unique position. Everything in your room needs a place to put it. Similarly, in your system, every task, event and project should have its specific location waiting for you. Mess is caused by things that are out of order.
Learning order can start with finding a place for things that have not been placed, and putting them in an orderly way. It may take you a day or two, but once it is done, it is easy to maintain.
When you put things away, once something that you don't know how to put appears, it will become very conspicuous. If you don't think it is often used, put it in a category that has something to do with it. If you think it may appear again, find a new place to put it. When it appears in large numbers, you can use its name as its category.
This is a concrete method, which classifies and puts everything in good order, so it is also clear to the brain. Don't let anything or things have nowhere to put, or there will be more chaos after it. So if you haven't tidied it up before, take the time to tidy it up from beginning to end, so you only need to maintain it in the future. Maintenance is actually a habit and can also be a manifestation of self-discipline.
In the past few years, I have been using a set of extremely efficient organizational methods that I have found. I call it a simple organized system because it divides all my information into only three categories. There are many kinds mentioned in GTD (Get Things Done), but most people don't need that many.
The three categories I summarized are engineering, tasks and events. Almost everything I need to record properly in one of these three categories. Only a few cases, about 1%, can't fit this system, but I can easily use a hodgepodge list to store these random ideas.
It is quite easy to maintain only three kinds of things. If you have 5, 6 or 12 kinds, you may not be very strict about distinguishing each type. This means that a certain class is easily forgotten, and it is difficult to become an efficient system. My three kinds of systems work well because I distinguish them strictly every time. They are always effective and don't mess up.
This is a very important idea, so I will explain it in detail in the next three sections.
Most things can have three situations.
1, project or project
2. Task
3. Events
In this way, things can be clearly classified, so as not to be chaotic and leave no opportunity for delay.
The first category is engineering. A project is a combination of many tasks for the same goal. Each task lacks structure. They are like jellyfish in the sea, swimming around without the support of bones or complex nervous system. Engineering is different. With engineering, tasks can be organized to achieve a more important goal. Writing a book is a project, and writing an article is a task.
I wrote down all the projects in detail on small pieces of paper, which outlined the results I was eager to achieve and the specific tasks that I needed to complete. Because it is very important to complete a project, not just those subtasks, I can handle tasks more flexibly. If I decide that I can finish my book without writing another chapter, I can cancel this task. For the benefit of the whole project, a certain task can be sacrificed.
The project is stable, and it doesn't need to be updated frequently in the chaotic information flow. They can frame you every day for weeks or months to come.
In fact, the project is a complex big goal, which can not be completed overnight. It may need a combination of many small tasks. When each small task is completed, then the project is completed. For example, making an App is a project, which requires requirements analysis, UI, UE, technology selection, architecture, development, debugging, testing, release, analysis and so on. And each item can be divided into more specific things.
Therefore, engineering is relatively a big goal.
Tasks are my to-do list. They are small-scale and independent behaviors that need to be completed. This list has three parts, global list, weekly list and daily list. The global list stores some tasks in the calendar that are not suitable for projects or events. The weekly goal and the daily goal are what I mentioned in the first chapter. They are what I need to do.
All parts of the system will be implemented in the task. Assign the tasks in the project to the weekly tasks every week. Assign events to the daily list as needed every night. My daily goal list is the only one I need to check and what I should do at this moment.
Any task that does not belong to the project, I will add it to the global list. Every week, they will also be assigned to the weekly target list as needed along with the engineering tasks. If a new task needs to be completed this week, I will adjust my weekly target list. If it needs to be completed on the same day, I will directly add it to the daily target list.
It is clearly divided into three tasks: global, weekly and daily. There should be no timetable for tasks in projects and events at the beginning. Evaluate the tasks every week and add them to the weekly task list, which is what needs to be completed this week. Then every night, assign some tasks from the weekly target list to the next day's daily list. In this way, just pay attention to the tasks in the daily list every day and finish them.
As for all other types of things, they are recorded in the global list, and then assigned to the weekly and Sunday lists at the same time.
The last leg of my organized tripod is the event. Events are those tasks or activities that need to be completed in a specific time. I have to do the tasks in the queue, and I can do them at any time as long as I feel fit, while the events are more limited. If I had made an appointment with Paul to have lunch at12: 00, I wouldn't have done it at 2: 30.
I use a calendar to store these events. Then, when the activity date of this event arrives, I will transfer it to my daily goal list. I try to avoid putting it in the weekly list in case there are too many tasks to manage and filter. At this time, my daily list contains all the independent tasks, which are from projects and events, and should be completed on this day.
The tasks in the project are basically irrelevant to the specific date and time, but complex projects do not exclude all kinds of dependencies. I think it may be necessary to cooperate with projects and events here. For example, if I want to build a server, I need to buy services and domain names on a cloud, and that domain name needs to be filed. We can't control this time, so we need a schedule to organize these dependencies.
Like engineering, I believe it is important to write down your goals. Keeping them in your mind will prevent you from completing them. Writing them down on paper has several advantages:
I write down my goals together with the project. I prefer to write them down on paper because it makes "writing" more tangible. Write down your goals as if you were communicating with yourself.
Pin the record that you have achieved your goal in another clip, feel the weight, and you will feel incredible motivation. I will also give myself more confidence. So you can't do this if you don't write it down.
Write down your goals on paper or cards and accomplish them one by one. Finally, those completed tasks will give you a sense of accomplishment and make you more confident and motivated. This is a matter of opinion, and everyone can find their own way to encourage themselves. Some softwares record these things. Although the author advocates that it is more "feeling" to record on paper, it doesn't matter what method only can achieve the same effect.
My coherent philosophy is branching method. No one will design a perfect coherent system in advance. Life is changing and information is changing, so your system will change with it. Instead of finding a "perfect" system, it is better to develop a system that can adapt to changes.
The branching method is such a system. The idea of divide-and-conquer method is that you should make a review of your system and pay attention to these questions in the review:
Consider those three problems regularly to prevent the system from becoming chaotic and difficult to manage. This is a way to maintain the system.
The communication log is attached and optional. Because some people don't need this, such as students. But as a salesperson, you need to call a lot of people every day and follow up. You need this.
A basic communication log is a piece of paper about your communication and progress with each person or organization. Create a table containing date, time, contact information, contact person and what was said. Whenever you talk to someone in your diary, you need to write it down.
The advantages are:
This is a good record habit of communicating with people. When you cooperate with multiple people at the same time, you will always forget where the current thing is going. At this time, you need to record it and work with the task system. First, it is more efficient, and secondly, it is to prevent some unexpected forgetfulness.
This proposal combines many steps to keep organized. I guess you didn't make your promise at least 60% of the time, not because you couldn't, but because you forgot. Someone asked you for some information, but you forgot to reply. I sent you an email, but it just piled up in my inbox.
To be more reliable, the first thing is to record everything on your capture device. If someone asks you something, you should first record it. When I talk and communicate, I never let the content stay in my short memory. One exception is that I can record them directly into my tasks, projects or events.
The next step is to make sure that those vague items can be filtered into your weekly and Sunday goals. For example, you promised to send a report to someone, but you didn't say the specific time. If there is such a situation, you need to customize a time plan to complete it. Add it to your daily goal, weekly goal or calendar. This will ensure that it will eventually be implemented. If you don't have such a systematic process, it will easily be delayed forever. In the eyes of people who are involved with you, always procrastinating is as bad as not keeping your promise.
Write down what you said you would do, have a habit of "remembering at any time", and then organize them into daily to-do lists at the right time, such as daily, weekly or other management items. This will ensure that they will not be forgotten and can be finished in time.
The benefits brought by this are also obvious. Not only can your work efficiency be improved, but you can also leave a reliable good impression on others, which is good for cooperation or other things.
There is a difference between being neat and being organized. Your desktop may be clean and untidy, but it may not be organized. Being organized is not just superficial work, it is about how to keep a system, which makes it easy for you to find what you want, and how to save it in this way.
You may remember doing such a clever thing when you were a child: you were asked to tidy your room, so you swept everything under the bed. The room looks neat, but it's completely disorganized. It is easy for adults to do things like this. You may not put everything in the filing cabinet. You may just be neat rather than organized.
Organization is a system. If you do the following, you will have organization:
Organization can be understood as classification or order, and each item is clearly arranged. When something is mentioned, you may not know the specific location or specific information immediately, but you know what it belongs to. So you will filter out its specific location through your brain in a short time, just like file collection or goods shelf. How do you determine where one is among the numerous documents or articles? According to the classification and label, it can be found in just a few processes. This is indeed the key to improving efficiency.
When you arrange your life and work in order, you can save a lot of time and do more meaningful things.
How do you organize all the things you have learned? For college students, they may record by taking notes or highlighting in books. But after graduation, how should you record any of your thoughts?
I found that a useful skill is that when you are reading, you can take notes through a notebook. In this way, I can capture some ideas, quotations or interesting information when I am reading. Maybe you may find it boring to take notes when you are not prepared to put into practice, but I find that taking notes can help:
Maybe I read a lot of books, but when I look back carefully, I can't remember some key things, or I forgot all my thoughts at that time, so it is necessary to take notes.
Record the main contents or opinions of the book and record your own thoughts. This is very helpful for learning and building your own thinking.
There are many different ways to keep your hard drive organized. Although there are many articles on the Internet that explain these from one system to another, the main idea is the same: arrange a place for everything, maintain it daily and detect changes.
There are two digital files that differ from other things:
For computer files, there should be reasonable storage rules, and unnecessary files should be cleaned and classified regularly. Store the commonly used and the infrequently used separately. Developing the good habit of sorting and cleaning documents will not only improve efficiency, but also make you feel better.
To become an organized person is actually to make work and life predictable and orderly, from a person whose thoughts are chaotic, so that his home, desk, workstation and mobile phone computer are all in a mess, to become a regular and trustworthy person by slowly cultivating various orderly habits. This is not only done as an efficient person, but also to cherish life. Our life time is limited. If we waste a lot of time looking for things, thinking about something desperately, doing things in a roundabout way, dragging our feet and so on, we will lose a lot of fun and do a lot of things we like to do less.
This paper not only mentions the importance of organization, but also gives some specific skills and methods, so try to find your own suitable method.
If you don't have to learn, you don't have to learn. From now on, be an organized person.