How to increase your work focus with old-school pen and paper ?
Spoiler : Yes, it implies planning.
Be reassured, it takes me 30 min per week to plan my next week. Hardware is simple : a notebook and a pen, or even two pens if you need colors.
You think I’m yet another micromanagement freak ?
I sure hope not. I work in IT, and my job is NOT management. My job is to be creative and to develop new ideas and new products.
So why should you care about what I have to say ?
First, I developed this method for myself. Because, I really needed at some point to stop procrastinating at work. I was on the slippery slope, no ambition, endless days waiting for the time to go home. I almost made paper planes to spend time. And second, because if you are in this schema too, I hope my solution can work for you as well.
Basis : the Bujo
If you never heard about Bujo, you missed quite a trend !
Bujo is actually short for “bullet journaling.” Ryder Carroll, an artistic director from Brooklyn, created this new way to jot down ideas and tasks. This technic gathered many aficionados. Some share their Instagram artistic spread styles. Other show their notebook spreads in “PlanWithMe” videos on YouTube. Head to the official guide for more info: http://bulletjournal.com/
I already use the Bujo technic for my personal organisation. I manage personal appointments, projects I want to develop, shopping lists, wish lists… So far it’s a success. I am satisfied with the changes this organisation system brought into my life. It frees my head from overwhelming things-not-to-forget.
Meanwhile, I tend to get lazy at work. My procrastination level had become a professional sport with daily practice. We all have these moments at work, when your mind keeps counting the minutes until freedom…
Adaptation to work context
So I decided to apply my successful technic to my professional life as well !
The goal is simple : stop procrastinating. Complete meaningful tasks each day, feel like I serve a clear purpose.
My visual style for this Bujo is minimalist on purpose. I cannot afford to draw or colorize my notebook at work, think of the look of my colleagues… For the context, I work as an IT research engineer in a research and innovation department. I manage my own projects and create new projects as I want.
Liberty comes with a price : I am accountable for how I use my own time. Because sooner or later, I have to show results to my supervisors. Being in high-tech field means no one actually uses pen and paper anymore. We are gone digital for everything. Our agenda are electronics and we even send mail for coffee breaks although we sit next to each others…
But I found out that unplugging from all these wonderful online tools, is the key to re-focus. Distractions you see, are more difficult to find when not online.
A look at my notebook
For work, I have only the basics : an index, a future log, monthly spreads and weekly spreads. They are very functional and works well for me. But these spread are for low-level task management.
On top of that, I need a big picture of all my projects, the mid to long-term view. Simpler is better, so my solution is a list. A look at it and I can prioritize projects depending on criteria that matters in my job.
Where you are and where you go
Now what about performances? Tracking progresses is useful in countless ways. Whether you want to make sure you will have this annual bonus, or whether you want to finish a project in time. For me the carrot is the bonus.
We are a big company, so we have an online evaluation system, for annual and quaternary results. I copied my quarterly goals next to progress bars. I fill the progress bars weekly or monthly, and it helps me to see where should I put my efforts next. Thanks to that, I am able to define three objectives each month depending on my progresses. These becomes three columns in my monthly spread. And four lines cut it down to weeks, where I divide the goal into small actions. I find that it makes planning easy and helps keeping track of progress in the same time !
As a person, I don’t find motivation if I don’t see the big picture. A job is such a huge part of your time, you better make sure it’s not wasted time. My way is to check once or twice a year that it fits my needs, my tastes and gives me nice opportunities for the future. For that I have a spread in my professionnel notebook where I put my impressions, and later check if I still agree. When you are stuck in day-to-day projects, feeling that something is wrong, this spread helps.
Working with an online agenda
But what if a meeting appears suddenly in my agenda ?
Let’s be honest, you have an eye on your mails yes ? So you won’t miss a new appointment. In my case, I don’t have much of sudden meeting, so my weekly sync with Outlook is enough to keep track of my week’s meetings.
The important trick is to not overthink the sync of your notebook, because it will burden you with too much work. And you will end up actually procrastinating.
Other small tricks
With this organisation, I can already say that I am more productive. To be honest, it is not only due to Bujo but also to other tricks I use. Like starting my day with the things I don’t want to do, and leaving what I am excited to do as last tasks. And like using the Pomodoro technic.
This way of self-organizing my professional mess saved me when I lost my drives. It’s a personalized version of the Bujo, I hope I can inspire your to make your own version !
