Understanding Personal Knowledge Management (PKM): Essential Theory to Build Your Own System

Summary

This video script delves into the fundamentals of Personal Knowledge Management (PKM), emphasizing the importance of an effective system for organizing and utilizing information. It introduces the three golden pillars of PKM: capture, retrieve, and emerge, and discusses methodologies such as daily notes, log redes, and task management. The script guides viewers on setting up a PKM system using tools like Obsidian, to create a network of interconnected notes that foster serendipitous discovery and enhance productivity.

Takeaways

• 📚 Personal Knowledge Management (PKM) is about streamlining how you gather, organize, and use information effectively.
• 🔑 The three golden pillars of PKM are Capture, Retrieve, and Re-emerge, forming the foundation for an effective knowledge management system.
• 💡 Capture involves making the process of saving information as frictionless as possible, considering how future you will retrieve it.
• 🔍 Retrieve emphasizes the importance of having a reliable system in place to quickly access information when needed.
• 🌟 Re-emerge highlights the serendipity of discovering valuable information unexpectedly as your notes and ideas connect and interact.
• 📝 Daily Notes First is a methodology where a daily note serves as a central point for logging and organizing activities and thoughts.
• 🔗 Log Redes (Log, Relate, Discover) is a system for capturing all valuable information and connecting it to relevant notes or pages.
• 📈 Getting Things Done (GTD) principles can be applied to PKM for effective project and task management within a knowledge management system.
• 🚀 Sprints and Efforts is a methodology for recording specific actions or sessions related to projects, providing a timeline of progress and resources used.
• 🌐 Obsidian is a tool that can be used to build a PKM system, allowing notes to link and reference each other, facilitating the re-emergence of ideas.
• 📚 The script introduces the concept of vaults in Obsidian, such as the Evergreen and Work vaults, for organizing and managing different areas of knowledge.

Q & A

What is Personal Knowledge Management (PKM)?

Personal Knowledge Management is the process of streamlining how you gather, organize, and use information. It involves creating a system that helps you effectively manage the knowledge you acquire for personal or professional growth.

Why is PKM important for an individual?

PKM is important because it helps individuals to efficiently manage the information they encounter daily, ensuring that they can retrieve and utilize it when needed. This leads to better decision-making, learning, and overall productivity.

What are the three golden pillars of personal Knowledge Management?

The three golden pillars of PKM are Capture, Retrieve, and Re-emerge. Capture involves getting information into your system efficiently. Retrieve ensures that you can easily access the stored information. Re-emerge refers to the serendipitous discovery of information that was stored but not actively sought, which can lead to new insights.

How does the 'Capture' pillar work in PKM?

Capture in PKM is about making the process of getting information into your system as easy and frictionless as possible. It involves saving information from various sources like meetings, conversations, podcasts, and personal thoughts in a way that is accessible for future use.

Can you explain the 'Retrieve' pillar in PKM?

The 'Retrieve' pillar focuses on the ease with which you can access information from your PKM system. It's about trusting your past self to have organized the information in a way that your future self can find it quickly, often within seconds.

What is the concept of 'Re-emerge' in PKM?

Re-emerge in PKM is the unexpected discovery of information that was previously stored. It's about the serendipity of finding a note or a piece of information that relates to your current work, which you didn't actively seek but is valuable for your current thinking.

What methodologies are suggested for building an effective PKM system?

The methodologies suggested for building an effective PKM system include Daily Notes First, Log Re-discover (Log, Relate, Discover), Getting Things Done (project and task management), and Sprints and Efforts.

What is the purpose of 'Daily Notes First' in PKM?

The 'Daily Notes First' methodology is about having a daily note that serves as a jump-off point for everything else you do that day. It helps in organizing daily activities and thoughts, which can then be connected to other notes or projects.

Can you describe the 'Log Re-discover' methodology?

The 'Log Re-discover' methodology, also known as 'Log Redes', is a system for capturing all information that you find interesting or valuable. It involves logging the information with enough context, relating it by assigning tags, and later discovering or creating a homepage (Map of Content) to consolidate and organize this information.

How does 'Getting Things Done' methodology fit into PKM?

The 'Getting Things Done' methodology fits into PKM by providing a framework for project and task management. It helps in organizing projects into sub-projects and tasks, making it easier to track progress and manage workload effectively.

What is the 'Sprints and Efforts' methodology and its role in PKM?

The 'Sprints and Efforts' methodology is about making focused efforts on tasks or projects for a specific period. It helps in documenting the work done, resources used, and progress made, which can be linked to projects and sub-projects for easy retrieval and reflection.

Outlines

00:00

📚 Introduction to Personal Knowledge Management

This paragraph introduces the concept of Personal Knowledge Management (PKM), emphasizing the importance of understanding theories and concepts to create an effective PKM system. It highlights the session's focus on exploring the meaning of PKM, the three golden pillars of PKM, and the necessary toolkit and methodologies. The speaker invites the audience to a 'PKM game show' to familiarize themselves with PKM theories, starting with defining PKM and its purpose, which is to streamline the gathering, organizing, and using of information.

05:03

🔍 The Three Golden Pillars of PKM

The speaker elaborates on the three foundational pillars of a personal Knowledge Management System: capture, retrieve, and emerge. Capture involves the effortless intake of valuable information, considering how future self will retrieve it. Retrieve is about accessing past information efficiently, relying on a system that aligns with the capture process. Emerge refers to the unexpected resurfacing of ideas or notes, facilitated by tools like Obsidian, which allows notes to link and reference each other, fostering serendipitous connections and aiding current thinking.

10:03

🛠️ Methodologies for Effective PKM

This section introduces four methodologies tested over two years to adhere to the three golden pillars of PKM. The methodologies include daily notes as a daily starting point, log redes for capturing stray thoughts and ideas, 'Getting Things Done' for project and task management, and Sprints and efforts for elevating PKM to the next level. The speaker provides an overview of how these methodologies contribute to an organized and efficient PKM system.

15:04

🗓️ Daily Notes and Log Redes Systems

The paragraph delves into the daily notes system, which serves as a central hub for daily activities and thoughts, branching out to other ideas or notes. It explains how daily notes roll up into weeks and form an interconnected web of information. The log redes system is introduced as a method for capturing all interesting or valuable information, assigning tags for context, and eventually discovering and creating content from these logs. The paragraph illustrates how information is captured once and then pushed to relevant pages or 'Mocs' for future retrieval and use.

20:05

📈 Project and Task Management with GTD Principles

Inspired by David Allen's 'Getting Things Done', this paragraph discusses project and task management within the PKM system. It outlines the structure of projects, sub-projects, and tasks, and how they contribute to stress-free productivity. The speaker suggests using Obsidian for this purpose, though acknowledges that for some, a more robust task management system might be necessary. The paragraph provides an example of how projects and tasks are organized and managed in Obsidian, emphasizing the clarity and organization it brings to complex projects.

25:07

⚡️ Sprints and Efforts for Project Progression

The final methodology discussed is Sprints and Efforts, which involves making concentrated efforts on tasks and documenting these efforts within the PKM system. This method allows for a clear timeline of work done on projects, making it easy to pick up where one left off after a long period. The speaker highlights the effectiveness of this approach in providing a quick and efficient way to retrieve information about past work and efforts invested in projects.

🌟 Building and Structuring Your PKM System

In the concluding paragraph, the speaker guides the audience on how to build up their PKM system, now that they understand the theories and have the toolkit. The speaker mentions two types of vaults: the Evergreen Vault and the Work Vault, which are used to organize different aspects of personal and professional knowledge. The audience is encouraged to watch further videos on setting up Obsidian, incorporating the discussed theories to enhance their relationship with information.

Keywords

💡Personal Knowledge Management (PKM)

Personal Knowledge Management (PKM) is the process of gathering, organizing, and using information to enhance one's own knowledge and skills. It is central to the video's theme, emphasizing the importance of an effective PKM system for personal and professional development. The script mentions that PKM streamlines how an individual interacts with the information they acquire, and it is the foundation upon which the rest of the video's concepts are built.

💡Capture

In the context of PKM, 'capture' refers to the initial stage of collecting information that comes into one's system, whether from meetings, conversations, or personal thoughts. The script highlights the importance of making capture as frictionless as possible to ensure that valuable information is not lost and can be easily retrieved by one's future self. It is the first of the 'three golden pillars' of PKM discussed in the video.

💡Retrieve

'Retrieve' is the process of accessing information that has been previously captured and stored within one's PKM system. The script discusses the need for a reliable retrieval system, where the information is organized in a way that allows for quick and easy access. It is the second golden pillar of PKM, and the script emphasizes the importance of trust between one's past and future self in the retrieval process.

💡Reemerge

Reemerge, or emergence, is the spontaneous resurfacing of information within one's PKM system, often in unexpected ways. The script describes it as a serendipitous aspect of PKM where notes and ideas can resurface and contribute to current thinking. It is the third golden pillar of PKM and is illustrated in the script through the use of a note-taking tool that allows for linking and referencing, enabling ideas to reemerge when needed.

💡Daily Notes

Daily Notes is a methodology mentioned in the script for managing daily activities and information. It serves as a 'jump-off point' for everything else one does in a day, providing a central location to log and organize thoughts, tasks, and ideas. The script uses the example of a daily note for a specific date, which branches out to various activities and notes, illustrating how it can be used to map out a day's events and tasks.

💡Log Redes

Log Redes, a term coined in the script, stands for 'log, relate, discover.' It is a system for capturing all information that one finds interesting or valuable, then relating it through tagging and context assignment, and finally discovering it by creating a homepage or 'map of content' (MOC) for deeper exploration. The script describes it as a critical component of an effective PKM system, allowing for the organization and retrieval of diverse information.

💡Getting Things Done (GTD)

Getting Things Done (GTD) is a productivity methodology referenced in the script, originally developed by David Allen. It focuses on project and task management, aiming to create a stress-free approach to productivity. The script discusses how GTD principles can be applied within a PKM system, such as using projects and tasks to organize work and progress towards goals. It is one of the methodologies suggested for building an effective PKM system.

💡Sprints and Efforts

Sprints and Efforts is a concept introduced in the script as a way to track and organize work done on projects. It involves making a concentrated effort to complete a task or set of tasks within a specific timeframe, then documenting these efforts within the PKM system. The script describes how this methodology can provide a timeline of work and resources used, allowing for quick retrieval of past work and reducing the feeling of being overwhelmed.

💡Map of Content (MOC)

A Map of Content (MOC) is a term used in the script to describe a homepage for a specific topic within one's PKM system. It serves as a central hub for all notes, ideas, and information related to that topic, making it easier to find and review relevant content. The script illustrates how MOCs can be used to organize information, such as cooking recipes or project notes, and how they contribute to the interconnectedness of one's knowledge.

💡Obsidian

Obsidian is a note-taking and knowledge management software mentioned throughout the script. It is highlighted for its ability to link and reference notes, allowing for the creation of an interconnected web of information. The script discusses how Obsidian can be used to implement the various methodologies and principles of PKM, such as Daily Notes, Log Redes, and the reemergence of ideas, making it a tool of choice for the presenter's PKM system.

Highlights

The session focuses on personal Knowledge Management (PKM), emphasizing the need for understanding theories and concepts to make one's PKM system effective.

Personal Knowledge Management is defined as the process of streamlining how you gather, organize, and use information.

The importance of having an optimal PKM system to avoid spending hours searching for information that should be easily retrievable.

Introduction of the three golden pillars of PKM: Capture, Retrieve, and Re-emerge.

Capture is about making the process of saving information as frictionless as possible for future retrieval.

Retrieve involves trusting your past self to have organized information in a way that can be easily found.

Re-emerge is the concept of serendipitous discovery of information that was stored but not actively sought.

Obsidian is highlighted as a tool that allows notes to talk to each other, facilitating the re-emergence of ideas.

Daily notes are presented as a methodology for having a daily starting point that branches out to other ideas or projects.

Log Redes is introduced as a system for capturing all valuable information and ideas, enhancing PKM.

Getting Things Done (GTD) by David Allen is referenced for its principles on project and task management within PKM.

Sprints and efforts are discussed as a methodology to track and record the progress and efforts put into projects.

The concept of an 'MOC' or Map of Content is introduced as a homepage for specific topics, central to PKM structure.

The practical application of daily notes in logging and organizing daily activities and tasks.

How log Redes works in conjunction with daily notes to push information to relevant pages for later retrieval.

The importance of having a structured PKM system to avoid feeling overwhelmed and to maintain productivity.

The speaker's personal experience and recommendations on setting up a PKM system using Obsidian.

Encouragement to watch further videos on setting up Obsidian for PKM, including the Evergreen and Work Vaults.

Transcripts

you are here because you have an issue

the issue is either Gathering organizing

or the using of information your

knowledge management system is not

working for you and the reason why it's

not working is because you might not be

familiar with the theories and Concepts

that you need to know in order to make

your knowledge management system an

effective one so this session is all

about knowledge we will look at what

personal Knowledge Management means

we'll talk about the three golden

pillars of personal Knowledge Management

then we'll go into the toolkit the

theory that we need to understand in

order to build out our personal

Knowledge Management System and that is

daily notes first log redes it is

combining the two of them it is project

and task managements and it Sprints and

efforts so sit back relax and take in

the theory that you will have to

understand if you ever wish to have a

loving relationship with your

information

welcome to the PKM game show and in this

game show we're going to go through

three questions to get you familiar with

the theory related to personal Knowledge

Management this will be a quick segment

but it's very important because we are

going to go through the tools the

theories the methodologies that you need

in order to set up your personal

Knowledge Management System are you

ready my friends and family and

guests I hope you are because we are

going straight into question number one

what is personal Knowledge Management or

PKM if you are already a subscriber of

my channel you should have some idea of

what PKM is what it's use for how it's

useful for

you but my experience is most people

haven't thought deeply about this

question and this is where you need to

start you need to understand what you're

trying to do in order to achieve

something that would serve you that

would be beneficial to you if you just

go into this journey blind you won't get

to the result that you want or you'll

get less optimal results now what is

personal Knowledge Management if we

break down the words personal Knowledge

Management personal stands for yourself

it is your identity knowledge it's

knowledge that we acquire but what do we

want to do with that knowledge want to

interact with it we want output from it

we want to digest this

information so the

answer in a very simplistic way of

explaining it is it streamlines how you

gather organize and use information

that's it we all have our own personal

Knowledge Management Systems

it just might not be

optimal you might have a notepad that

you take notes on you might have a

physical Journal that you write in you

have Google Maps where you save

restaurants you have notes on your

iPhone that you put down quick thoughts

and ideas and things you want to

remember you save posts on social

media but your personal Knowledge

Management System is quite dispersed you

might spend hours looking for a thing

that you knew you saved at a point in

time but you cannot

retrieve and that means that your PKM

system is not up to scratch it means

that there is something wrong with it so

this channel we explore what a personal

Knowledge Management System should be

and why it's important for you and the

tools and methodologies available to you

but you need to understand the key

Concepts so that you can create

something beautiful so question number

two what is the three golden pillars of

personal Knowledge Management so if

personal Knowledge Management is to

retrieve store and use

information what would be the foundation

of the system what would you need in

order for the system to

work and this is also something that you

always need to think about when you

gather information you put it into your

system how will this information be used

what is the restrictions that I put in

this information how would I use this

information again where would I retrieve

it so what is the foundation the

structure which we always need to think

back to the basic laws of personal

Knowledge Management that we need to

adhere to in order for it to be useful

and I've come up with the three golden

pillars and according to me if you

adhere to these three golden pillers

you'll fine and the first one is

capture now capture is when information

comes into your system captures wherever

you receive information this might be in

meetings this might be in conversations

this might be own thoughts this might be

from podcast from YouTube it is all the

information that comes to your system

that you want to save now you want to

make capture as easy as

possible but you also need to think

about where this information is going to

go you need to think about future you

how will future sure you use this

information and you need to be in that

mindset of okay I'm here at this point

in time I have this knowledge which I

found interesting or valuable and I want

to save and it's intended to be used

somewhere in the future For My Future

Self how will future self retrieve this

another thing about capture is you want

to make it as frictionless as possible

if there's too much friction you won't

use it so capture you need to think

about future yourself how are you going

to put it in a way that future you can

find it and it needs to be frictionless

because if it takes an hour to put a

piece of information into your system

you'll quickly get

bored and next one is retrieve now you

are trying to retrieve something from

past you and then you might need to put

yourself in the mindset of how would P

me have entered that information for

myself now at this point in time to find

it

and retrieve is all

about being in the right place because

you should trust past you your past you

should have the same systems that future

you have there need to be some type of

alignment now between capture and

retrieve there's a conversation going

and this will take time to refine to

effectively communicate between

effectively the two different people so

this will evolve this will be a

relationship that Bol with yourself you

want to capture information in such a

way that you know future you would find

it and future you need to trust pass you

to put it in such a way or present in

such a way that it can be useful and

retrieved easily so it also needs to be

frictionless if you know that there's a

piece of information in your system you

should be able to retrieve it within a

couple of seconds if not your personal

Knowledge Management System is

broken and lastly which I find the most

valuable in some sense is reemerge or

emerge this is where Serendipity comes

into your system that lucky golden

nuggets that you didn't expect to

find and the tools that we use for our

personal Knowledge Management System for

now is Obsidian and obsidian allows for

linking and referencing and it basically

allows for notes to talk to each other

and this allow for idea

thoughts notes conversations to reemerge

when you least expect it and it helps

with your current thinking so emergence

this is when you're working on something

and you start typing a note and then you

find a note from two years back which

relates to the subject that you didn't

know that you put into your system and

somehow that note has found its way back

to you now think about it this is

beautiful we have obsidian which allows

for all of this functionality of notes

coming to you when you need it of

popping up out of the ether compared to

the old way of consuming and using

information and folder structures where

the notes are jailed to a specific

folder that would never see the lights

of day again now reemergence does not

just come with notes it comes with our

log system a log red system there's

multiple ways for you to retrieve

information and throughout this video

when we go through the work Vault you'll

see how reemergence works so capture

retrieve emerge the three golden pillars

question three what methodologies do we

use let's backtrack a little bit to

understand what we mean by

methodologies we are using a software

called obsidian in order to build our

personal Knowledge Management System we

know in a personal Knowledge Management

System we need to adhere to the three

golden pillars which is capture retrieve

and reemerge in order to adhere to these

pillars we use a toolkit and these

toolkits are methodologies these are

methodologies and structures that we use

in order to make our personal Knowledge

Management effective to make it adhere

to the three golden pillars I have four

in mind and these methodologies are

methodologies that I have tested over

the last two

years and I feel you need to have these

four in order to have a knowledge

management

system that aderes to the three pillars

the first one is daily notes first which

is basically means that you should have

one note that you should come to on a

daily basis and it provides your jump

off point for everything else on that

day we have log redes which is a system

that I came up with which stands for log

relate discover this is a system that

works with the daily notes first system

which helps you capture stray thoughts

and ideas random thoughts random ideas

random things that interest you and

pushes it through to the relevant

Pages getting things done that's just

reference to a book by David Allen in

which he speaks about project and task

management and lastly we have Sprints

and efforts which I feel is one of those

ingredients which just elevates your PKM

to the next

level let's start running through them

we're going to start with the daily

notes

first the daily notes first I'm going to

go back to a diagram that I used

probably a year ago in one of my videos

I spice it up a little bit with

different

colors but at the left hand side you can

see that we have a typical week and each

orange dot represents a daily note it

starts with 2024 1 of January and it

ends with the seventh of January for

that week those notes they roll up to a

specific week now if you look at the

type of information that we might have

captured on each day we can see it

branches out to other colored

circles you might wonder what do these

represent well each of these colored

circles either represents a note or an

idea just some connection that was made

between today and this specific note you

can see that that are different colored

circles they all get pushed through to

something called an Moc and an Moc it

stands for map of content and it's

basically a homepage for specific topic

you can think of a cooking Moc which is

your homepage for everything cooking

related so on each day when you cooked

the meal you wanted to log your progress

and log the recipes that you've tried

you want those notes and those ideas and

those logs you wanted to be pushed

through to a home note and and this

spiderweb of connectiveness this is

what's being formed notes are starting

to speak to each other notes are being

pushed to where you will consume them

later where you want to review them

later and you can see there's always

connections being made and it acts

similarly to the connections in your

brain now we have one week full of

connections you can see over time that

these weeks pile on and the weeks they

start to form connections more

connections the interweb of connection

that you have decided this gets larger

and larger and larger but the funny

thing with a personal Knowledge

Management tool like obsidian and the

strategies that we use in order to make

it an effective personal Knowledge

Management

System it does not get more overwhelming

with more connections with more notes

because we do it in such a way that it's

always

organized and now we have an idea of the

daily notes first how the

connections would form what does a daily

note look like now daily notes might

look something like this very

simplistic we have today's date as the

heading of this page and then we might

have a log and this is how I like to

capture everything that I'm busy with in

a day and I Tred to get people to buy

into this daily notes for system where

you use this as a platform to jump of

and go into different directions think

of this as your main story line and

everything else is little side

Adventures at 9:00 a.m. we went on a

side Adventure away from our main story

line and we went to the gym to excise

legs and we went into a one of 45

minutes at 2 p.m.

we diverted from the main story line

again to go on a side adventure to a

meeting with the manager and at 6 p.m.

we went off the main road again in order

to go on a little side quest which was

related to cooking so we made a red

lentil Curry and gave some comments I

used too much salt added extra garlic

with smice you can see that this is

almost a map of things and places that

you went to on that

day now the next concept that we use in

combination with the daily notes first

system or methodology is something that

I like to call log redes stands for log

relate discover and this is a system

which is critical to my knowledge

management system and and I think

there's not enough people utilizing this

functionality now what is loges loges is

essentially a system where you can

capture every and all information that

comes into your realm into your sphere

into your bubble that you find

interesting or valuable this could be

from Reading from podcasts from having

conversations from watching TVs and

movies from watching YouTube reading

articles just thinking anything that

your interest which you might find some

value for later goes into the

system one way that I make my social

media scrolling a little bit more

productive is if I come across a cool

post related to a new restaurant that I

want to visit or a cool location that I

never heard of that I might want to

travel to I pop this into my system

saying this is on traveling on Europe on

nature reserve on Europe traveling so

you just add enough context for that one

idea and then in the future you might

want to revisit a collection of ideas

but then I should have hundreds of logs

of things that I find interesting so

it's curated for you by

you and then the next step is relate the

relate already happens when you log it

you assign tags to it you will assign

context to it think about improving your

sleep habits whenever you come across

information that pertains to sleeping

and better sleep hygiene you add the

necessary tags and then two months down

the line you must have found time in

order to explore this concept in more

detail and that's when you create a

homepage when you get to the Discover

pod where you create an Moc map of

content which is also a

homepage and you pull in all of that

information in order to make something

out of it to change your habits and

that's the outputs that's the fruit that

you see in the Discover

phase and we've developed this in our

system to make it as easy as possible

because we don't want any valuable ideas

thoughts knowledge information that we

deem interesting enough to go to

waste you might wonder how do we use the

daily notes for with loges everything

that we do can be a log and loges just

shows how information gets pushed to

different areas how information or input

it we can see again at 9:00 a.m. we

logged an exercise using the log R

system we logged it we said we went to

the gym we have a hashtag saying this is

log exercise gym and had a tough gym

session and then we loged the SAA

session this is information that we

might want to come back to see how many

times did we JY legs in a year when did

we have injuries related to jimming legs

or how many sessions of sauna did we

have how long did I sit in the sauna for

these are just archive not really

valuable information but you can see how

in the future if you have enough

knowledge you can extract value from it

and this log through the log R system

that's captured on your daily note gets

automatically sent to your exercise

Moc now for our next side Adventure that

we went on we had a meeting with our

manager and that is a note that we just

referenced on our daily note

and that is going to be a meeting note

by itself in the meeting which we'll go

through

later in the meeting we will have all

the details related to who was in the

meeting what was the context of the

meeting everything that was said in the

meeting the tasks that came out of it

but that note itself will pop up in our

meetings MC so you can see there's

multiple ways to retrieve information we

can either go to our daily notes and see

oh yes I remembered that I had a meeting

that day or we can go to our meeting sem

see or we can go to our project related

to that meeting and find the meeting

there as

well and the last side quest side

Adventure that we went on was cooking

red lenal curry and that gets sent to

our cooking log in our cooking homepage

or cooking

M you can see how these different pieces

of information get sent but but the

spider web of

interconnectiveness is

Amplified when we start looking at the

cooking

example we have ree red lentil Curry

which gets reference in the cuisine

vegetarian homepage but the cuisine

vegetarian homepage gets reference in

our cooking homepage because it's one of

the

Cuisines and if we go back to the recipe

red lville curry you can see that it's

also reference on the recipes but the

log is sent to all three pages because

that's how we set it up it goes there

automatically so I'm hoping you start to

see the value in a system like this it

organizes information for you where you

only have to capture it

once now the next principle that we want

to get to the next methodology is

something by David Allen from the book

getting things done and he basically

talks about how to have stressfree

productivity related to project and task

management and I would put a disclaimer

that I don't think obsidian is

necessarily the best project and task

management system you need to figure out

if this is complex or simple enough to

use in your use case and I know there's

some people that want a more robust task

management system and I would say use

obsidian conjunction

with applications like todoist or

mandame or whatever your software of

choice is for task managements for me I

feel obsidian works well enough because

I revisit my obsidian dashboard often

enough to make it useful I also have it

on my

phone but other people might not have

the obsidian sync so the project and

task management functionality might not

be up to your standards but this is

something that you need to discover for

yourself I do believe that you should

still have projects in obsidian and then

maybe Outsource the

tasks now from getting things done we

have project management which is the top

of the mountain that is your end goal

and the tasks assigned to the sub

projects in order to finish this entire

project that is basically your progress

towards that goal if you finish all the

tasks the project will be done as

well now an example of project

management and Tas management together

you can see that we will have the first

level horizontal second level horizontal

third level horizontal and these are

just the different subc atories so we

start with work personal creative so

these are your

overarching project Pages if you want to

go look at all your personal projects

you go click on that personal page and

there you'll see all the personal

projects that you have in your system so

you can see we have different projects

project family vacation 2024 project

gardening project cooking and these all

personal projects that we have now when

we go to the second level horizontal and

we click on let's say for instance

project family vacation 2024 we're going

to have more sub projects related to

that project now we are on the third

level horizontal level we can see we

have four sub projects destination

research travel Arrangement

accommodation booking activity planning

and then we go to the vertical lineage

which is essentially the task management

of this whole

project and we can see that we have all

the different tasks and we can also see

that if we check off these tasks the sub

projects will be closed which means that

the main project would also be closed

and this is a simple idea this is also

how we structure it in obsidian we have

a project page for family vacation and

within that project homepage for family

vacation 2024 we're going to have four

sub projects and if you want to work on

destination research you're going to go

to sub project one and you can see all

your tasks all your efforts all the work

that you've already done related to this

project will be in one place it would

give you comfort to know that you won't

get bugged down in details you won't get

confused as to what you've done already

and what you still need to do because

everything is well structured get your

mind well acquainted with this structure

because if you have this structure in

mind if you relate all the tasks and all

your efforts and all your work to a

project which rolls up to a main project

you won't get confused or feel that you

are overwhelmed

again and lastly we have Sprints and

efforts Sprints or efforts is basically

something that you

do for a project so let's say you have

task number one which is research

destination search online for vacation

spot R travel blogs list top three

destinations let's say you can get it

done in 30 minutes then you are going to

on your daily note you're going to make

a Sprint or an effort

and within that Sprint or effort you are

going to show what you've done so in

this Sprint or this effort I search for

vacation spots and here's the document

that I worked on related to vacation

spots here's the blog articles that I

read and this is where I listed my top

three destinations and that is an effort

which gets sent to your sub project

which also gets sent to your main

project so it

provides when you look back over the

whole project it provide yourself with a

timeline of every effort that you put

into this project so you can think of

these bonfires when you've traveled the

whole journey and you look back you can

see these little bonfires of how you got

to where you are

now and I don't see a lot of people

using this but this is so effective it

allows you to quickly and efficiently

retrieve information as to what you've

done the last time you were busy with

this task or project

it could be 3 years in between and you

can immediately see for this project

what was the last thing that I've done

where do I start again where's all the

resources that I've used in the past and

this just allows for more stressfree

work because you don't need to remember

what is the last thing you've done you

don't need to remember where's the

documents that you worked on last

because you're going to have a link to

it you won't have to remember I remember

watching that YouTube video about the

destinations but I can't find again

because you would have put that link

into the Sprints and efforts which

relates to your projects which relates

and roll up to their parent

projects now this is the last tool that

we're going to use in our toolkit

Sprints and efforts look at you you are

a personal Knowledge Management expert

now the next question is how do you

build it up

you understand the theories you have the

toolkits what do you do next well

luckily there's videos where I go

through the setup of my personal

knowledge management software of choice

obsidian where you can pull it out for

yourself and incorporate these theories

I have two vaults that I go through the

one is the Evergreen Vault and the other

one is the work vault in the future I'll

have a bunch of other vaults dedicated

or concentrated at specific subjects but

for now we have the Evergreen and and

work Vault please go watch those videos

and incorporate a better relationship

with your information strength and honor

strength upon your kin