Rethinking Note Taking Tech and Processes

Software
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I’ve been thinking about how ineffectively I take notes at work. Most of my issues are behavioral, rather than technology-related, so I’m hoping this community can share tips on software and workflows for capturing meeting notes, reference materials, and tidbits of information that may prove useful in the future.

I tell myself that Bear is the note taking tool I’m going to use, but in reality I end up:

  • Throwing random bits of information into Tot. I never take the time to go back and organize those notes so I eventually I run out of free dots and overload a dot with notes from multiple conversations
  • Adding notes to a Things to-do
  • Scribbling down notes on a legal pad. This is my preferred way of taking notes, but what I dislike is the aftermath; pages of notes that aren’t searchable, aren’t accessible when I’m not at my desk, etc.
  • Capturing information in e-mails that I have to dig-up later

Where Bear falls down is its inability to make hand written notes searchable (via OCR). For some reasons Apple Notes has never stuck with me, but I’d be willing to give it another shot.

I’d like to transition to using my iPad Pro, Apple Pencil, and Rock Paper Pencil for hand-written notes that get inserted alongside any typed notes and reference materials via a corresponding Mac app.

Ideally I’d have a note taking system that:

  1. Allows hand written notes to be searchable (via OCR)
  2. Has a clean UI
  3. Has a native backup feature
  4. Is multi-platform (at the very least great Mac, decent iPadOS support, and passable iPhone support where notes can be read)
  5. Uses iCloud for note storage, or at the very least supports client-side encryption
  6. Has a native ‘daily notes’ feature that automatically creates a new note each day
  7. Has at least basic Shortcuts support (primarily so I can grab open to-dos and create a corresponding to-do in Things)
  8. Will be supported for the long-haul and has a team, rather than a single individual, behind it
  9. Receives regular updates

I’m excited to hear what the community recommends.

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If it is searchable handwritten notes you’re after, I believe most of your 9 requirements can be met by GoodNotes 6. Not the daily notes feature, and not 100% the to-do-to-Things requirement (though that is easily workable with GN).

(We don’t know what your handwriting is like of course, but it’s easy to grab a trial of GN6 and see for yourself.)

Katie

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I’ll answer first on what you call the ‘behavorial’ issues. It would be helpful to hear more about the sort of work you do; size of organisation; your freedom to choose your own tech, and so on.

In any case, be very, very clear on whether you have a problem waiting for a solution, or a solution that is looking for problem. The latter can easily be fuelling the constant search for better systems, shinier apps, more frictionless workflows, that if only once implemented would make our lives amazingly efficient and infinitely pleasurable. (Note this is a fiction).

So first question is, are you dropping balls? Is your note-taking so dysfunctional that you are not meeting your obligations? Are you burned out every day from managing an overwhelming amount of tasks? If yes, then better note taking might well help some of this. But of course, many workplaces and their always-on ‘interactive hive-minds’ (see Cal Newport) stack the odds against the lone note-taking pioneering with their supercharged kitbags. Note-taking ain’t the problem, in that case.

Anyway - if you are functioning just fine, perhaps your note-taking is just fine, too.

Ask at every juncture what the notes are for. I imagine that the key take-away from a meeting is a list of your commitments, promises, deadlines, and so on. At least in my working environments, almost never do meetings serve to deliver key info that isn’t available already elsewhere (spreadsheets, memos, strategy docs, newsletters). So as long as you know where to find that info and collate it with your stake in them, you are good to go.

By the way – I am basically talking to myself here. I am dreaming of a total system, whilst coping with the fundamental disorganisation and informational proliferation that is the curse of every knowledge worker today.

On apps: when handwriting I used Nebo on the iPad, which ticks some but not all of your boxes. I also just bought the lifetime access to Goodnotes 6 which I really like. When on screen meeting, I tend to type into .md files and have a quick meeting template text expansion. I have yet to find a good storage solution for these typed notes – alongside the meeting docs I’ve manually-saved; in a bespoke ‘meeting notes app’ (which I have tried and never return to); or both (can be done e.g. in DevonTHINK using tags or smartgroups).

My challenge is operating in an Office 365 environment where resources are increasingly in the Cloud, attached to emails, and calendar bookings, whilst I have invested in DevonTHINK, Obsidian, and an iPad. Microsoft OneNote would be the best way to square that circle but I find no joy in it, and so can’t motivate myself to use it more. It may yet go the way of different apps for different environments in my life: e.g. the above setup for research and writing; and a deeper dive into the Microsoft apps for ‘corporate’ (in my case, university) management and policy stuff). It is already going that way since at the moment, e.g., I am co-organising a major conference with a team of four: we use Microsoft Planner and OneDrive to share resources – since it’s freely available to us. Not my choice of apps in the sense they give me joy. But dictated by the IT environment. So it’s least worst / least friction / good enough solution to a problem.

Happy note-taking!

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You seem to have a system already, albeit one that causes more problems than it solves :wink:.

It might be worth spending a bit more time trying to work out why you throw random pieces of information into random apps - what is the context or trigger that would make you use Tot rather than a yellow pad or Things? I suspect that the long-term answer might be more about what you do AFTER you have made immediate random notes: for example, doing a daily note gathering exercise where you write up the key points of your yellow pad jottings or copy over and expand your Tot notes into a single place.

If handwriting is important to you, using Goodnotes might be helpful, because it will stop you have to type it all up, but I still think you need some step of filtering and editing and some trusted place to keep the results or it becomes another place to dump.

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Same here. I posted about this earlier in the month. I’ve been cleared to use Todoist and Obsidian, but Todoist isn’t playing well with Outlook right now – an issue they have been “looking at” for months. And Obsidian is fine, but when I’m trying to take meeting notes I have to admit – it makes more sense to just hit a button in OneNote and “suck in” all the meeting details/attachments. I also like writing vs typing my notes so again, OneNote wins there, too.

If I’m honest with myself, I think I’m a bit of a tech contrarian. If I were forced to use Obsidian at work, I’d probably download Notion :rofl:. I joke, but I don’t deny that’s a part of it.

When I type something into Obsidian though, it’s faster (thanks markdown) and I know where the underlying data is stored. I’m not looking for a shortcut to a Sharepoint site that I have no control over. I also like the way they implement “daily notes”. I’m not sure they’re entirely useful, but I’ve been writing a few points every day for six months now so it feels like a regression to go back.

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Apple Notes meets most of your criteria, including searchable handwritten notes and quick capture. You can even scan documents into it.

I use AN for all professional and personal notes. For meeting notes, I attach emails, agendas, spreadsheets, Word docs, and more as needed. I can also add my to-dos from AN to Reminders or another task manager, e.g., OF. You can also mix typed and handwritten notes.

AN is “multi-platform” within the Apple ecosystem or as you described it, available on the Mac, iPad, and iPhone.

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When I take handwritten notes, I will go back to my desk and type them into Obsidian. If it is a Zoom meeting, then I’m typing into Obsidian directly. If something is worth keeping, it is fine to take the extra five minutes to type them in again.

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I don’t disagree, but for me, I find the handwritten stuff easier to review at a later date.

If I was in a meeting that took a few different directions I may have used blue ink, black ink, red arrows, a diagram. I find just a quick glance at the page jogs my memory really quickly. If it’s a wall of text in Obsidian it doesn’t come back to me as quick.

This is highly personal and took a long time to realize, but I’m very visual.

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Very good advice, IMO.

More good advice

I’m much like you. I’ve always taken notes on whatever is available. iPad, legal pad, back of an envelope, etc. And when white boards in meeting rooms was the norm, I would snap pictures of what was written with my old Nokia.

Then I would dump everything into Evernote so I could search for the information later, even in the photos of the white boards. Today I upload everything into Google Drive and search my notes along with my mail and everything else in Drive when needed.

I would suggest starting by getting a little better organized. Maybe “throw” your random bit of information, along with everything else you bring from a meeting, into a folder on your Mac so nothing gets misplaced while you are rethinking your process.

Not my cup of tea, but definitely an “everything bucket” to consider.

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Oh man did you just start a dumpster fire :rofl:

Seriously though, I had similar issues until I became clear with what I was capturing and how I organized it for later use. David Allen’s GTD was a life saver for me.

Quick capture items go in an Inbox to determine if it is actionable or cruft. Instead of pages of notes, I capture a few key points and my take-away action items……etc etc etc.

If I may suggest, focus first on the process then finding tools that can help make that process easier.

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I’d start here. I’ve had the same problem until very recently, and the review part is the most important, regardless of system.

Super basic, but watching this really helped me:

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