Using the PARA method with Notion

Summary

The video script discusses the application of Tiago Forte's PARA method within the Notion workspace. PARA stands for Projects, Areas, Resources, and Archives, serving as a system for organizing life's information. The speaker shares their experience using the method since 2018 and clarifies that Notion requires users to impose structure as it is not prescriptive. The script delves into how to apply PARA to Notion, addressing common challenges and the need for adaptation due to Notion's dynamic nature. It outlines a customized flowchart for saving information in Notion, considering whether items are appointments, tasks, discussions, or notes. The video also explores the integration of personal and team PARAs in a complex Notion setup, emphasizing the importance of metadata and the ability to generate tasks quickly. The speaker encourages viewers to adapt PARA to their needs, take what works, and leave the rest, highlighting the flexibility of the method.

Takeaways

• 📂 The PARA method (Projects, Areas, Resources, Archives) is a tool-agnostic system for organizing information, which can be adapted to Notion's dynamic application.
• 📅 Projects in Notion are defined as goals with deadlines and are actively worked on, while areas represent ongoing responsibilities or standards.
• 📚 Resources are saved items related to various topics of interest, and archives are inactive items from the other categories meant for future reference.
• 🤔 When saving information in Notion, consider where it fits within the PARA framework, but don't be too rigid as Notion's databases can blur these lines.
• 🔄 Notion databases require adapting PARA to account for their unique features, functionality, and limitations, which may necessitate workarounds.
• 📆 Time-based events and tasks are saved in an actions database, which can be linked to a calendar app for synchronization.
• 💡 Tensions database is used for asynchronous resolution of decisions and questions, which is not part of the traditional PARA framework but is crucial for workflow in Notion.
• 📝 Notes and ideas are saved in context-specific databases, such as a content database for editorial purposes or a people database for individual profiles.
• 📚 The library database serves as a catch-all for information, resources, and reference materials, supporting projects without the need for physical relocation of data.
• 🔗 Metadata and relations are crucial in Notion; moving an item to a different database should not result in loss of connected information.
• 👥 For teams, the separation of personal and team PARA can be complex, and Notion's sharing and permissions features must be considered in the setup.
• 🏡 Personal, shared, and team areas are managed through different databases and sections in Notion, allowing for a clear distinction of contexts and access control.

Q & A

What is the PARA method?

PARA stands for Projects, Areas, Resources, and Archives. It is a tool-agnostic system for organizing all the information in your life.

How does the PARA method help in structuring a Notion workspace?

The PARA method provides a framework for categorizing information into Projects, Areas, Resources, and Archives, which can then be adapted to Notion's database structure to create a well-organized workspace.

What does Tiago Forte define as a project?

Tiago Forte defines a project as a goal with a deadline, something that you're actively working on, representing short-term efforts with a certain goal in mind.

How are areas different from projects in the context of PARA?

Areas are areas of responsibility or standards to maintain over time, requiring ongoing attention, often related to daily habits and meaningful rituals, whereas projects are goal-oriented with deadlines.

What is the role of resources in the PARA method?

Resources are items saved related to a range of topics that you're interested in or exploring, things that you're curious about, inspired by, and learning about.

How does the concept of 'tensions' fit into the Notion adaptation of the PARA method?

Tensions are decisions or questions that help move projects forward. They are resolved asynchronously and usually result in a next action, which is then added to the actions database.

How does the Notion database structure add complexity to the application of the PARA method?

Notion databases require adapting the PARA method to account for Notion's unique features, functionality, quirks, and limitations. This may involve creating workarounds for tasks that cannot be directly achieved in Notion.

What is the significance of metadata in the context of a Notion workspace?

Metadata in Notion allows for the connection and relation of content across different databases, enabling a richer context and more efficient workflow by linking tasks, projects, resources, and assets.

How does the Notion workspace handle the archiving of projects?

Projects are archived by changing their status to 'archived' within the projects database, rather than moving them to a separate folder, thus retaining all associated metadata and historical context.

What are some challenges faced when applying the PARA method to a team Notion workspace?

Challenges include managing personal and team information within the same workspace, dealing with Notion's limitations on sharing and permissions, and avoiding complexity when separating personal, shared, and team areas.

How does the speaker recommend adapting the PARA method to individual needs?

The speaker suggests taking a flexible approach, using the aspects of the PARA method that work for you and leaving the rest, ensuring that the setup aligns with your personal or team workflows.

What additional resources are available for learning more about the PARA method and effective Notion use?

The speaker recommends Tiago Forte's new book 'The PARA Method', his online course 'Building a Second Brain', and the Notion Mastery blog for in-depth articles and courses on Notion and organizational principles.

Outlines

00:00

📚 Introduction to PARA and Notion Structure

The speaker introduces the PARA method, which stands for Projects, Areas, Resources, and Archives, as a tool-agnostic system for organizing life's information. They discuss how Notion, being non-prescriptive, requires users to impose structure for effective use. The speaker shares their experience with Tiago Forte's Building a Second Brain course and how it helped them apply PARA within Notion, addressing challenges and adaptations specific to Notion's dynamic application.

05:01

📅 Applying PARA to Notion: Projects and Actions

The speaker delves into the application of the 'P' in PARA, which stands for projects, defined as goals with deadlines. They discuss how areas are ongoing responsibilities, resources are saved items of interest, and archives are for inactive items. The speaker outlines a customized flowchart for saving information in Notion, emphasizing that Notion's databases add complexity requiring adaptation from the traditional PARA method. They also mention the use of Google Calendar and Zapier automation for time-based events and tasks.

10:04

💡 Adapting PARA for Personal and Team Workflows

The speaker describes how they have adapted PARA for their complex Notion workspace, which includes both personal and work-related projects and actions. They discuss the challenges of applying PARA too literally and the need for flexibility. The speaker also addresses the integration of personal and team PARA, especially in the context of small business owners, and the limitations of Notion regarding sharing and permissions.

15:08

📝 Personal and Shared Areas in Notion

The speaker outlines their approach to personal areas in Notion, which are maintained through unique dashboards and wiki pages. They explain how these personal areas are separate from team-shared databases to avoid clutter. The speaker also details how they handle ongoing personal projects through a 'LifeAdmin' project in the shared projects database, with scoped access to maintain privacy.

20:09

🏠 Household and Team Areas in Notion Workspace

The speaker describes the separation of household and food-related information in their Notion workspace, which is kept distinct from work-related content. They discuss how team areas, or departments, are represented in a database that serves as a unique dashboard for each department, featuring relevant projects, actions, and resources. The speaker also explains their use of the library database as a catch-all for reference materials and how archiving projects in Notion is as simple as changing the project status to 'archived'.

🔄 Flexibility and Customization in Applying PARA

The speaker emphasizes the importance of flexibility when applying the PARA method to Notion, encouraging users to adapt it to their specific needs. They mention the creation of Notion Mastery to help users develop systems thinking and organizational principles. The speaker also promotes Tiago Forte's book and course for further understanding of the PARA method and concludes by inviting viewers to ask questions and engage in discussion.

Keywords

💡Notion

Notion is a versatile workspace tool that allows users to organize and manage their information. In the video, the speaker discusses how they used Notion to structure their workspace, particularly by implementing the PARA method. Notion's flexibility is highlighted as it enables users to create databases and views that cater to their specific organizational needs.

💡PARA method

The PARA method is an organizational system developed by Tiago Forte, which stands for Projects, Areas, Resources, and Archives. It is a tool-agnostic system for managing information in one's life. In the video, the speaker shares their experience of applying the PARA method within Notion, emphasizing the importance of adapting the system to the unique features and functionality of the platform.

💡Projects

In the context of the PARA method, 'Projects' refers to goal-oriented tasks with deadlines that require active work. The speaker in the video defines projects as short-term efforts with specific goals in mind, and discusses how these are managed within Notion's database system, particularly in relation to the actions database.

💡Areas

Areas in the PARA method represent ongoing responsibilities or standards that need maintenance over time. The speaker describes areas as important parts of life or work that require consistent attention, such as daily habits and meaningful rituals. In Notion, areas are adapted to personal and shared contexts, like personal dashboards and departmental pages.

💡Resources

Resources are saved information related to various topics of interest or areas of ongoing learning and curiosity. The speaker explains that in the context of Notion, resources are not just topics but also serve as a team knowledge base, including reference materials, research notes, and assets. The library database in Notion acts as a catch-all for resources.

💡Archives

Archives in the PARA method consist of inactive items from the other three categories that may be saved for future reference. The speaker clarifies that in Notion, archiving is as simple as changing a project's status to 'archive' rather than moving it to a separate folder, preserving the historical context and metadata associated with the project.

💡Tiago Forte

Tiago Forte is the creator of the PARA method and author of the book on the same topic. He is also the instructor of the 'Building a Second Brain' course. In the video, the speaker mentions taking Forte's course and applying his methods within Notion to improve their workspace organization and information management.

💡Databases

Databases in Notion are used to organize and store information. They can be customized to hold various types of content, such as tasks, events, notes, and resources. The speaker discusses the use of databases to implement the PARA method, including projects, actions, areas, and archives, each serving a specific function in their workflow.

💡Workflows

Workflows refer to the processes or sequences of tasks that are followed to complete work. In the video, the speaker talks about how the PARA method helps to design and improve workflows within Notion, making information management more efficient and accessible. The speaker emphasizes the importance of creating workflows that are easy to use and tailored to the user's needs.

💡Metadata

Metadata in Notion refers to the data about the data, such as creation date, last modified date, and other attributes that provide context to the information stored. The speaker highlights the importance of preserving metadata when organizing and archiving projects in Notion, as it provides valuable context and historical information that can be referenced in the future.

💡Automation

Automation in the context of the video refers to the use of tools like Zapier to streamline and automate tasks within Notion. The speaker mentions setting up automations to move information from Google Calendar to their actions database in Notion, illustrating how automation can enhance the efficiency of managing projects and tasks.

Highlights

In 2018, Tiago Forte's PARA method was instrumental in structuring the author's Notion workspace.

Notion requires users to impose structure due to its flexibility in information storage.

PARA stands for Projects, Areas, Resources, and Archives, offering a tool-agnostic system for information organization.

Tiago Forte has released a book on the PARA method, prompting a deeper exploration of its application within Notion.

A common challenge with PARA is taking its categorization too literally for Notion's dynamic application.

Projects in PARA are defined as goals with deadlines, representing short-term efforts.

Areas represent ongoing responsibilities or standards that require continuous attention, often related to daily habits.

Resources are saved materials on topics of interest, including those that inspire learning and curiosity.

Archives are for inactive items from the other categories, saved for potential future reference.

Notion databases add complexity, necessitating an adaptation of the PARA method to Notion's features.

The author uses a customized flowchart to determine where to save information in Notion, adapted from Tiago's book.

The flowchart helps discern where to save items in Notion, deviating from a strict interpretation of PARA.

The author's Notion setup includes a projects database with a two-way relation to an actions database.

Personal areas in Notion are managed through unique dashboards within a personal dashboard page.

Shared areas like household management are kept separate in a team space within the Notion workspace.

Team areas, or departments, are represented by unique dashboards that display all related projects, actions, and resources.

The library database serves as a catch-all for reference materials, simplifying the process of saving and categorizing information.

Archiving projects in Notion is as simple as changing the project status to archived, preserving historical context for future reference.

The author emphasizes the importance of adapting PARA to one's needs and workflow, rather than strictly adhering to its framework.

Transcripts

YT-PARA ===

[00:00:00] When I was first setting up my Notion workspace back in 2018, it was Tiago

Forte's para method that helped me give my workspace some much needed structure.

At the time I was taking his Building a Second Brain course, which is awesome.

And it really helped clarify some ways of thinking about the data.

[00:00:16] If you're a Notion user, you probably know that Notion is not terribly opinionated

about where you actually store your information.

So you yourself need to give it structure in order for it to be helpful and useful.

So Para is essentially a tool agnostic system for organizing all the information in your

life.

[00:00:32] PARA stands for Projects, Areas, Resources, and Archives.

Now, Tiago has recently released his new book on the PARA method, so I thought it might

be good to dive into how we actually apply PARA inside of Notion, and what are some of

the key challenges that pop up, and how we've adapted it to our complex workspace.

[00:00:48] We get asked questions, all the time about Para and how to apply Para in Notion.

I think one of the most common reasons that people get really tripped up in Para is when

they take it way too literally.

You don't [00:01:00] have to translate Para exactly one to one inside of Notion because

it's just a different tool.

[00:01:05] It's a more dynamic application.

It doesn't work like a Finder window on your computer where you're moving files into one

specific place.

So let's start with the P in Para, which is for projects.

And Tiago defines projects as a goal with a deadline.

It's something that you're actively working on.

It's short term efforts in your work or personal life that you take with a certain goal in

mind.

[00:01:26] Areas are essentially areas of responsibility or standards to maintain over

time.

They're important parts of our life or work that require ongoing attention.

This tends to be in the realm of daily habits and meaningful rituals.

Resources are things that you save related to a range of topics that you're interested

in, or rabbit holes that you're going down, things that you're curious about, inspired

by, and learning about.

[00:01:46] And the final A is for archives. which are inactive items from the other three

categories.

These are things you might want to save for future reference, even though they're not

necessarily related to something active currently.

So when we want to save something, we have an idea, a piece of information, or [00:02:00]

something that we want to store, we ask ourselves, where does this live?

[00:02:03] So Notion databases add this layer of complexity that mean we have to adapt Para

to Notion's unique features, functionality, quirks, and limitations.

There are some things that you can't quite do in Notion, so it might require some workarounds.

Let's take a look at a flowchart that's adapted from Tiago's book to look at where does something

go when you're saving it into Notion.

[00:02:25] Now, again, this is customized to our specific setup, but I just want to

show you an example of how you don't need to interpret Paris so literally when we're

talking about Notion.

This is based on Tiago's original chart that has a number of questions to help you discern

where should something be saved.

[00:02:40] So the first question to ask is, is it an appointment or a meeting?

If the answer is yes, in our case, this gets saved to a calendar app, Google Calendar,

Cron, whatever you're using.

We have a Zapier automation set up so that anything that is saved to our Google calendar

automatically gets sent into our actions database.

[00:02:58] Inside of our actions [00:03:00] database, we keep all time based events and

tasks.

If it's not an appointment or a meeting, we ask, is it a task?

If yes, it goes into the actions database.

If no, we ask, is it a discussion or decision that needs to be made?

I've talked about this in other videos before, but how we use a tensions database as a team

to resolve tensions asynchronously, kind of in place of Slack, really.

[00:03:23] Tensions are basically anything that's a decision, a question, something that

helps us move projects forward.

And the idea is that when a tension is resolved, usually there's some kind of next action.

And so that will get added to the actions database.

The question of if something is a discussion or a decision is not in the para framework.

[00:03:42] Is tensions an area?

Is it a project?

Is it a resource?

It's kind of none of them.

It's just part of what helps us get our work done.

And that spans all projects.

It also spans all areas.

So there are certain databases in Notion that don't necessarily fit neatly into one of these

[00:04:00] categories, and that's okay.

[00:04:01] So we just have slightly more complex needs, and we've adapted our Notion as such.

So let's say it's none of those things.

We can ask, is it a note or an idea?

If it is a note or idea, depending on the context of the note or idea, we send this

to a different database.

So we ask if the idea or note is related to specifically content creation, we will save

that into the content database.

[00:04:25] The content database is basically our editorial calendar.

It's where all ideas for content that we produce get stored and saved with a status, an author,

an intended publish date, et cetera.

If the note is related to a specific person, we can add that to the person's profile inside

of the people database.

[00:04:45] Thanks.

If it's something else, if it's just a note that we're creating, a thought that you had

that you don't want to forget.

That just goes into the notes and ideas database.

Now, again, some of these databases blur the lines between what is a project, what is an

area, and even what is a [00:05:00] resource.

For us, people and notes and ideas are part of the knowledge hub, which is part of our

resource stack.

[00:05:07] The content database supports content creation as part of our marketing activities.

So you could say marketing is an area, but we have regular projects and activities that

we do every single week.

As part of that area.

So the content database supports projects and also supports areas.

And so it can get a little bit blurry, but that's okay.

[00:05:28] The point is that we have these databases that are very context specific that

allow us to get our work done.

In a way, the power of databases make it so that it doesn't really matter whether or not

it's an area or a project.

All that matters is that metadata is connected, that the content database can relate to a

project, it can relate to next actions, and it can relate to any resources and assets

required to complete that project.

[00:05:52] So if it's not a Notor idea, Is it a piece of information, a resource, or

reference material?

If it is one of these [00:06:00] categories, we can kind of further go down the chain and

say, Yes, in general, most things are going to get saved into the library database.

Any online courses that I'm taking, PDFs that I save, interesting articles that I'm reading,

all of that stuff gets saved into the library database.

[00:06:16] We also have some other nuances and things like using the ReadWise automation.

I really like ReadWise as a tool.

I use their reader app and so I can save things to read later and it gets saved into ReadWise

and it provides an inbox and then I can go through and decide do I want to save this

to Notion, do I want to move it into the library, or do I just want to leave it into the ReadWise

library.

[00:06:38] If it isn't, information, resources, reference material, etc.

It's worth asking, does this really belong in Notion?

So, this is a really adapted flowchart of kind of how I think about that Para breakdown

in the context of Notion.

A lot of this, again, is based on workflows and ease of use of finding information.

[00:06:58] It's not a one to one [00:07:00] mapping of the categories of Para.

So, again, Para was a loose inspiration.

And we've adapted it to some of the way that Notion interprets data and allows us to move

data around the space and works with some of the permissions limitations as well.

Tiago recommends regularly moving things between different categories depending on whether

or not they're actively supporting a project, an area of responsibility, or needing to be

shared.

[00:07:25] Again, this works when we're talking about folders, but in Notion, grouping things

into databases is what really allows us to supercharge our workflows.

But, we can't easily move items between databases without losing that beautiful metadata.

Let's take a look at an example project page in Notion.

So, here we have a project that's got all sorts of different metadata available.

[00:07:46] If I were to move this item, into a different folder, archive folder, a resource

folder, or something like that, we're going to lose all of this beautiful metadata.

So that means any relations that I've associated with this [00:08:00] project and anything

that kind of gives it that richer context gets lost, which is really the beauty of Notion.

[00:08:05] So the idea is that we can assign We can assign resources to this and we can

change the status of the project to make it archived.

We don't need to actually physically move this piece of data or information.

So again, para is really open to interpretation.

Now in the context of teams, Tiago recommends having a personal para and a team para.

[00:08:27] Which is fine in theory, but that can get really complex when you have small

business owners that are trying to manage both their work and personal in the same Notion

workspace.

Do you need two resource hubs or are you saving the same information twice?

It starts to get a little bit tricky.

Notion does also have certain limitations when it comes to sharing and permissions.

[00:08:46] So we usually start with access first in terms of that being the primary consideration

because Database access is all or nothing.

You can't just give partial access to database views.

It's probably one of Notion's most [00:09:00] hotly requested features that makes things

challenging when you're trying to bring in non Notion users into your workspace.

[00:09:06] So here are some of the ways that I adapt Para for a complex Notion context.

I'm an owner of the account.

The majority of projects and actions for the account.

Are for a work context.

All of my personal areas are also managed through this account.

We manage our family and household activities from this workspace as well with shared pages

that are visible only to my husband and I.

[00:09:27] So here's how it looks in more detail, the projects aspect of para and Notion.

It relies on two databases, the projects and the actions.

You can also integrate a goals database, but we're not going to get into that.

That's a rabbit hole for another day.

But basically the projects database is probably one of the most utilized databases in the

workspace.

[00:09:46] It's the lifeblood of our team workspace and everybody has access to that

database.

That projects database has a two way relation to the actions database.

So projects are basically how we group tasks and events together.

[00:10:00] Inside of Notion, all projects have actions to move them forward, and all

actions are associated with a project.

[00:10:06] Everything in your life is a project.

So nearly everything should be added into this database as a project.

Our project database has properties like owner, start and finish dates, scope, which is basically

how resource intensive or time intensive is this project.

A department associated with it, design, HR, operations, client services, et cetera.

[00:10:28] A priority, which gets reviewed and adjusted weekly.

Any sub projects that might be associated with this project, which is a self relation

to the projects database, so this allows us to have a parent child relationship with projects.

A goal database, which is basically the bigger goal that that project supports.

[00:10:46] The actions database, which is all related tasks and events required to complete

the project.

A status property helps us understand what status the project is in, if it's active,

ongoing, completed, archived, etc.

And then a little place to add [00:11:00] status updates, which is just a text field

so that the owner can update the project weekly as part of our weekly review.

[00:11:06] And this helps us see at a glance what's happening with that project.

The actions database includes all tasks, to dos, events, etc.

And that's essentially your to do list.

So generally speaking, all actions should be associated with a project.

So the projects aspect of Para is really projects and actions working together as two databases.

[00:11:26] So let's dig into areas.

Areas are interpreted pretty liberally in Rspace.

So here's how I think about it.

My personal areas are unique dashboards inside a personal dashboard in a private section.

of my workspace sidebar.

Using Notion's wiki feature, I converted this dashboard into a wiki page which kind of allows

me to have the design that I want, while also switching into an index mode that gives me

a listing of all of the databases inside of that page.

[00:11:53] It's totally optional to do this.

Before the wiki feature was launched, these areas were just pages inside of my [00:12:00]

personal dashboard.

They're not connected to any of the other projects and tasks or anything like that.

They are standalone dashboards that are just for that one specific context.

I like to tuck all of those source databases that are related to those areas into a toggle

at the bottom of the page.

[00:12:15] I like to call that the data basement.

And you can see there's all sorts of interesting databases in there that don't really relate

to other parts of the workspace that are more team oriented.

Now, of course, lots of these life areas do have projects and actions associated with

them.

And I still want to be able to manage those, but I don't want to clutter up our team shared

databases.

[00:12:34] So what do we do?

Inside of the shared projects database, I have three projects, which are for my personal

use.

And they are projects with a status of ongoing.

They don't have a nice tidy start and finish date the way most projects do.

They are basically ongoing projects that never really end.

So I have this catch all project called LifeAdmin.

[00:12:55] And that's where I can put all of my personal tasks.

Now, the nice thing about Notion is [00:13:00] you can scope out access to certain items

inside of a database.

So even though the project's database is shared with the team, I can say I only want LifeAdmin

to be visible to Ben and I. That means our other team member will not see this page in

the database.

[00:13:16] Then I have Health and Wellness, which is a project for any health and wellness

related activities.

Softball games, spa day, doctor's appointments, et cetera, things like that.

Personal development is a project for tracking all notes and actions and things related to

any kind of personal development initiatives, courses I'm taking, books I'm reading, et

cetera.

[00:13:34] You could of course lump all of those together into a life admin if you wanted

to keep it simple.

It's really up to you.

So by creating projects for these areas, I'm able to utilize all of the properties from

the project database structure, while still using the status property to mark the project

as ongoing.

[00:13:50] Thank That kind of allows us to blur the line between projects and areas.

Is it a project?

Is it an area?

It doesn't really matter.

All that matters is I'm able to generate actions [00:14:00] related to that so I can maintain

those standards or get those projects done.

So hopefully you can see how you don't really need to be so ridged with the different categories

of Para.

[00:14:09] For us, it's all about ease of use, access to the information, and ability

to generate new tasks quickly as needed.

So we've got personal areas and then there are areas that are shared.

So one example of this is household management.

And so because Ben and I are both owners of this team account, as well as a cohabiting

couple, we have a team space for our household that is visible just to the two of us.

[00:14:31] So any household projects, activities, resources, things that we're saving, uh, inspiration

for house projects, all of that gets saved into the household area and it remains completely

separate from all other parts of our workspace.

So technically this is an area, but it lives in the sidebar as a team space because it's

a shared area.

[00:14:50] And this is just one of the easiest ways to maintain this area.

Food is also a big part of our household activities, so a custom dashboard is there called Food

HQ that lives in the [00:15:00] sidebar for quick and easy access.

It's got stuff like a pantry manager, recipes, groceries, tips and tricks, cooking videos

that I've saved, etc.

[00:15:09] So everything household and food related.

All lives in that part of our Notion workspace.

And the reason it's separate is It's such a different context that I would use and access

that information.

I'm not usually accessing household stuff during the weekday when I'm doing work stuff

and vice versa.

I don't really need access to those sorts of things while I'm day to day getting my

work done.

[00:15:31] So those contexts can be very separate.

I don't need to worry about relations between those different databases.

It's pretty rare that I need information to overlap between those different contexts.

So we've got personal areas, we've got shared areas, and then we have team areas.

Which we basically refer to as departments.

[00:15:49] So we have a database called departments which essentially represents our team areas.

So I kind of use departments and areas interchangeably.

All projects are related to one of these departments.

[00:16:00] Each of these departments is basically a unique dashboard that displays all of the

projects, actions, resources, et cetera, related to this department.

[00:16:09] We can also include any unique source databases.

So one example would be our marketing and sales page is a dashboard that has the content

database featured front and center.

It has links to a media kit, marketing analytics, case studies, et cetera.

So how we feature and design the marketing and sales page, it's going to look different

than another department that doesn't need that same data.

[00:16:31] If we open the client services department, that's going to feature the people

database at the top.

There are consulting pipeline, quick links to our consulting offer pages.

Every single department page is designed to optimize for the most frequently performed

workflows and the most accessed resources within that department.

[00:16:49] So as I mentioned before, for resources, we don't just see resources as topics of interest

the way it's explained in the Para book, but it's more a team knowledge base for all of

our [00:17:00] reference materials.

Research, notes, ideas, assets, swipe files, and even people.

Anything that we reference as examples and inspiration gets collected in one of the key

databases in that section.

[00:17:11] Now, for the most part, the library is the catch all database for pretty much

everything that we're saving as reference.

So unless it's something specific, like a quote that I want to save or a swipe file,

pretty much, it almost always goes into the library.

By streamlining your workspace into a few core databases, you make it easier to relate

information together.

[00:17:31] So for example, Projects database is connected to the library.

That means every project can quickly and easily reference things that you've saved to the

library.

If you have 10 different resource databases, you're going to need a number of different

connections to the project.

It gets harder to maintain all of that.

[00:17:48] So the more databases you have, the more likely you are to struggle to answer

the question, where do I save this?

So for us, library creates this catch all database that most things can get saved to.

And that is seen as a [00:18:00] resource or a reference that supports our projects.

The archives part of Para is actually really straightforward.

[00:18:05] Projects get archived when they're no longer being worked on.

And you do that by changing the project status to archive.

There's no need to move the project into a different folder.

There's no need for archive specific folders.

It's just so easy to change a project status to archive.

And then all of that historical context related to the project gets saved and can be referenced

later easily.

[00:18:27] One of the reasons that historical context can be really helpful is if you do

similar projects over and over again, it's really nice to go back to old projects and

reference previous actions, time estimates, how many calls were done, etc.

And it can help improve your estimation of future projects.

So this is the para adaptation that's worked for our workspace for quite a few years.

[00:18:50] I haven't made a ton of major changes to the structure in a very, very long time.

So as an advanced user, I'm able to carefully mix, you know, private [00:19:00] and shared

data across different databases.

It's not necessarily the best or only way to set things up.

I wrote a more in depth article about this with some screenshots.

[00:19:08] You can read it on the Notion Mastery blog.

And if you have questions about it, post your questions below.

Notion is powerful, but it has its quirks and it requires a lot of know how in order

to apply Para effectively, especially if you are mixing personal and private information

with team shared information.

[00:19:24] Making things feel simple and easy to use workflow perspective.

is complex.

Notions features and functionality mean endless opportunities and customization when it comes

to how you structure your data.

But if you don't have experience with systems design, user interface design, or user experience

design, it's really easy to make a mess of things.

[00:19:44] This is one of the many reasons I created Notion Mastery because it's not

just about mastering the tool, but it's about developing systems thinking and organizational

principles that influence the way that you work.

So if you want to become a more thoughtful designer of your daily workflows and how you

move through Notion.

[00:19:58] Definitely check out the course.

We'd [00:20:00] love to have you in there.

And of course, if you want to learn more about Tiago Forte's work, you can check out his

new book, the para method, or check out his online course, building a second brain.

I know Tiago wrote the book and, and sort of developed the method with the intention

that it's meant to be flexible.

[00:20:14] So don't be afraid to adapt it to your needs.

Take what works and leave the rest.

Hope you enjoyed this video.

If you do have specific questions about how I apply para or how you might approach something

in Notion, definitely drop it in the comments below.

I'd love to hear it.

Thanks so much for watching and I will see you next time.