Evernote: The Right App for GTD (Part 1)
Why Evernote for GTD®
Published March 14, 2020
Last updated December 8, 2023
by Stacey Harmon
WHAT WE KNOW:
Intro: Evernote – The Right App for GTD® (Page 1 of 7)
GTD requires the creation of a trusted system outside your brain.
The GTD methodology is deliberately software neutral. It’s up to you to find the right GTD app for you.
Evernote’s the GTD app of choice for a sea of GTD devotees.
To succeed with GTD in Evernote, you need to understand:
Why it’s the right app for GTD (Part 1)
The right (and wrong) way to use it for GTD (Part 2)
When looking to build your trusted GTD® system, your first step is picking an app that will support your success over time.
Evernote’s an excellent choice. Here, I help you to understand the reasons why.
Part 1: Why Evernote for GTD
REASON 1: EVERNOTE’S MISSION = REMEMBER EVERYTHING™
“Remember everything” – Well, that’s easier said than done, right?
Our brains are powerful, but we’re human. We forget bread at the grocery store!
Since I’m looking for a tool to be my trusted system to hold everything outside of my brain, I have to consider a company whose trademark is, “Remember Everything” (this slogan, scrolled in chalk, greeted you in in the lobby in their then Silicon Valley Headquarters) and has introduced itself as “your second brain” on the sign up page.
A second brain? I can’t trust mine to recall it all, so the idea that I can have a back–up brain? Sign me up!
Plus, it’s no coincidence that their logo is an elephant. As we learn in childhood, elephants never forget!
Remembering is clearly part of the DNA of the company. This is a good start when picking a GTD app.
And, as Evernote continues to evolve, it’s focus has expanded to Remember Everything and Accomplish Anything. That’s exactly what I want in a GTD app!
REASON #2: EVERNOTE’S FLEXIBLE
GTD is a comprehensive life management system. And since your life is unique from everyone else’s, a one-size-fits all solution for your trusted system doesn’t exist.
Pick a tool that has flexibility so it can support your unique life needs.
Evernote is a flexible platform in several key ways.
First, Evernote works on all major operating systems.
This is a major consideration that many underestimate the long term impact of.
Choosing a GTD software app that works only on specific platforms is risky. It can lock you into future hardware choices, or worse, force you to switch GTD apps if your hardware evolves over time.
Instead, set yourself up for long term success by picking an app (Evernote) that’s hardware agnostic.
Think this isn’t an issue for you? Reflect back over the past 20 years. How many times have you switched technology platforms (you were sure that BlackBerry would be around forever, right)?
Even if you firmly believe you are in (for example) the Mac camp. Can you say for sure you will be in 8 years from now? What if you take a job and they require you to use a top of the line Window’s machine at work? Are you ok with not being able to access your GTD productivity system while at your new job?
Or maybe you think your Samsung Galaxy is the bee’s knees and has the best camera in existence. Can you really say for sure that it will always be this way?
Choosing Evernote as your GTD app comes with built in flexibility. You won’t be locked into hardware choices for the long-haul as you’ll be able to access your trusted system from whatever device you own (Mac, Windows, Android, iOS).
Second – Evernote is flexible in the data types it can handle.
If you can digitize it, you can store it in Evernote. It doesn’t matter if it’s text, a web page, image, PDF, .mp4, Excel spreadsheet, audio file, or email. Evernote can store and organize it.
This is a key differentiator in using Evernote as a GTD app and dramatically impacts the Capture phase of GTD’s 5 Steps of Mastering Workflow (more to come on this shortly).
And third – Evernote is flexible in its ability to organize data any way you like.
We know that GTD is a comprehensive life productivity methodology – one that asks you to track all that has your attention. This means you’ll be tracking lots of different use cases.
And, not all types of data should be organized in the same way. Something that goes through a process (for example an account that evolves from a lead, to a prospect, to an active client, to a closed deal) should be organized differently from something that holds a reference function (say, the user manuals for your oven, tv, and vacuum cleaner).
Because Evernote is an unstructured database, you can take the base set of organizational tools – notes, notebooks, stacks, and tags – and use them to organize your data however you want. This leads to heated debates within the Evernote community...and more on how you go wrong with organizing Evernote for GTD in a bit.
Savvy users can mix and match Evernote’s organizational tools to create different types of organizational structures within their account.
Basically, you have the freedom to organize vastly different data types in whatever way works for you!
When choosing Evernote as your GTD app, it’s important to understand that a reason Evernote is so flexible is that it’s “flat” in structure. You don’t create great levels of hierarchy in the tool (like you might with nested and sub-nested folders in Outlook, for example).
Evernote devotees understand that there’s no deep hierarchical folder structure in Evernote. This is both disruptive to the conventional way of digital organizing and also transformative to your productivity when understood.
Flat and flexible is better because:
“People who create complex folders indeed rely on these for retrieval, but these preparatory behaviors are inefficient and do not improve retrieval success.” - IBM Research 2011
Search is faster and more accurate than navigating a file structure and Evernote search is POWERFUL. It’s much like Google search: fast and accurate in serving up what you’re looking for but also laser-focused only on the information you’ve collected over time.
You aren’t locked into a predefined structure
You can organize divergent types of data and craft different types of workflows unique to your specific needs
What we focus on and track in our lives evolves over time. This directly impacts the organization we choose, which ideally we should change to suit our current projects and interests.
When choosing a GTD tool, why would you pick one that forces you into an overly structured organization that’s pre-defined by a group of programmers? Pick Evernote — which is incredibly adaptable and can be customized to work best for you and the specifics of what you want to track.
Evernote’s brand positioning plus it’s structure as a flexible platform are compelling reasons to consider Evernote as your GTD app.
But the most convincing reason is because you can execute on all 5 Steps of Mastering Workflow all within one app.
Learn how this works next.
Next – Part 1 Continued: One App vs Many for the 5 Stages of Mastering Workflow (Page 3 of 7)
Trademark Notice: Neither Stacey Harmon nor Harmon Enterprises, is licensed, certified, approved, or endorsed by or otherwise affiliated with David Allen or the David Allen Company which is the creator of the Getting Things Done® system for personal productivity. GTD® and Getting Things Done® are registered trademarks of the David Allen Company. For more information on the David Allen Company's products, please visit their website: www.davidco.com.