How I Created a Game-Changing AI-driven Productivity System: Part 1
My Productivity system Journey from a notebook-based system to fully digital and AI Powered system.
My productivity system has been a work of many years in making. It went through multiple phases of changes from a traditional notebook-based system to digital and now towards an AI-first approach. My learning so far is that building a productivity system is a journey, and it keeps evolving with time. I felt that I should share my experience in building this system so far.
This will be a two-part series. Part-1 focuses on providing a background and the evolution of my productivity system.
Background
It was in December 2017 when I was looking back on the year, as a reflection point, listing down things I was able to achieve as a person and at work. One of my significant achievements, that year, was stepping up to become a team manager for the first time in my career. Work was getting busier with managing teams and other job duties.
On the personal front, the family was growing. My son started having his little life events like Taekwondo, Soccer practices, play dates, etc. Social connections also needed to be managed, timely managing bills, budget, etc. Things could just pile up if they are not organized and pushed through a system that will not let my brain be overwhelmed with the pressure of managing everything all the time.
It was obvious that I need a better system. Not knowing much about what that system is — should it be a better time-management system, a better task-management system, or a better life-management system? Furthermore, should there be a separate system for work and personal life or one system? There were just more questions than answers.
So, the research started, reading how successful people manage so many things and create the essential balance in life. Some systems sounded more appealing, while some sounded to be a bigger bite and the others sounded more impractical at that moment. Then there was a day when I came across Bullet Journal (BuJo). Don’t worry, this is not an article on BuJo setup and all the fancy creativity journals out there. If you google or do a you-tube search, you will find a lot out there, but that is not the intent of this article.
My experience with BuJo for at least a couple of years of religiously doing it was to get into a habit of managing my priorities and better anticipate what is coming up next week, next month, or next year. BuJo is a very simplistic and minimalistic system, but it became too stretchy and too much dedication and commitment for me. I think I was on to building a more simplistic productivity system that will become an integral part of my everyday world.
The most important part of this phase of the productivity journey was to create a habit of managing tasks, and actions religiously every day. A habit that lets the brain know that things can be dumped outside in a reliable system to free up brain power for more creativity. It was also essential to have a single system that integrates all aspects of my life — work, personal and social aspects.
The Evolution of My Productivity System
Over the coming years, things started becoming more organized. I started by putting down my requirements for a satisfactory productivity system, periodic understanding of what is working and what is not, and making necessary changes to satisfy the requirements for a good productivity workflow.
I started with an old-style notebook-based system because it was essential to be flexible and know how and what is critical to me. Through my periodic review sessions, once a month, I was able to make some decisions on what part of my productivity system is ready to be digitalized. Starting with the most common free apps with the best reviews and incorporating them into the productivity workflow was an important next step. There is a lot of information available, but it is essential to have hands-on with these apps to ensure they work for the requirements I have. The workflow I envision building is the one that is available to me anytime, anywhere, and on any device that I have access to.
Finally, with multiple attempts of trying out a few apps and scrapping a few, I have settled down and built my ecosystem for the ultimate productivity foundation that is geared towards an AI-first approach as a next step.
The most significant part of this phase of the productivity journey is to continue the habit of collecting your ideas, thoughts, tasks, to-do’s, events, and goals in a system that works end-to-end. As you can see, there are changes constantly happening; for example, switching from paper to digital apps and finding new apps that felt more relevant! The focus on more sophistication led to brainstorming on making investments in the right purchase of apps, which will be covered in Part — 2.
My Productivity System
Here is a screenshot of my productivity workflow that works great for my day-to-day activities. It is fully integrated to drive my core responsibilities such that the focus is on the right tasks and achievement throughout the day. This gives a great feeling of an organized life and never having to worry about missing any important events. All the guesswork, reminders, and priorities are driven by this system. My role in this is to be religiously using it every time, sincerely planning things so that the system knows my priorities, and periodically doing housekeeping to stay organized in managing the most critical information related to my life.
To simplify, there are 3 important components of my productivity system-
Collector with automation
Control having AI Algorithm setup and
Co-ordinator integrated with AI algorithms
Let us see these in detail -
Collector to collect things that I have to manage either today or in the future. The goal is that this component can quickly collect the inputs from digital interfaces or human interactions. Examples of these are in the diagram like emails, phone calls, to-do in the form of creating an event, reminder, action, project tasks, research, collecting ideas to explore later, etc. I will go over the details of how digital automation helps in quick collection, in Part — 2.
Controller to help with planning and getting the above events, actions, and schedules on the Calendar(s). Over a while, I realized that daily, weekly, and monthly planning sessions can get overwhelming. So, I started exploring about embedding Artificial Intelligence (AI) to simplify this so that some events, actions, and schedules can be easily planned when my Calendar shows free time. It sounds like magic, but I will go over the details of this in the next part of the article.
Co-ordinator to help execute the plan. For me, my calendar is the most important part of the productivity system. The goal is to get everything collected, prioritize, and scheduled on the Calendar app. This becomes a ‘single pane of glass’ and less hassle in managing my life. In Part -2, I will discuss how there is a seamless integration of an AI-based algorithm with my Calendar app. Once the task is executed, if needed, take notes of things that are done, in progress, or incomplete, and relay them back to the collector for future scheduling. The bidirectional arrows in the diagram denote that.
Productivity is achieved when your daily activities are executed per your plan. Activities can be — managing the work or project tasks, taking & managing information or notes, journaling, and creating or consuming content. Managing events, schedules, and actions like calling a friend or parents, staying on top of your bills, driving kids to their events and activities, etc.
When I see all the workflow steps are well managed by my productivity system without taking up hours from my busy schedule, I feel more organized and satisfied. It helps me manage my priorities and focus on the right tasks and the right time.
As indicated through this write-up, in the next part of this series, I will go over the logic behind selecting each of these apps and how they help with the collection, controlling, and coordination with an AI-first approach. Stay tuned!!
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