September 6, 2022

Individuals and teams often come to Notion hoping that it is going to solve their productivity problems.

Unfortunately, what they’re failing to acknowledge is that they usually have an underlying system problem, not necessarily a productivity or technology problem.

It won’t matter what tools you’re using to execute your work, or how much desire you have to be productive, unless you’ve established a system for getting things done.

<aside> <img src="/icons/thought_gray.svg" alt="/icons/thought_gray.svg" width="40px" /> Your Notion workspace is only ever going to be as effective as your foundational systems.

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Here are some things to consider about your systems before you jump into Notion, or any other tool:

Define your desired outcome.

One statement I like to keep in mind is ‘process before technology’. A system is just a collection of processes. Often we pick a shiny, new tool and try to figure out how to include it in our workflow, rather than designing our system first and selecting tools to incorporate second.

Start by defining what you are trying to accomplish through your system. Be as specific as possible. Think about how you would describe the experience of having a ‘successful’ system.

Outline the path to achieve your desired outcome.

What are the steps you (think) you need to take to get to your desired outcome? This can and will evolve, so just start with a basic, broad overview. Remember that your system is not your tools—what you want to establish right now is the path, independent of the tools that might help you travel it. For example, if your desired outcome is to have an organized knowledge management system that makes it easy to surface notes and connect ideas, the basic path you identify may be: capture resources, process resources, utilize resources, review resources.

Get stakeholders on board.

It’s all too common for teams to operate in silos and forget that their systems often encompass multiple stakeholders. This leads to miscommunication, misunderstandings, and ineffective processes (and thus, systems!). All the folks who will regularly interact with a system should be consulted and included in the process of designing it.

Some questions to ponder:

• Is there consensus amongst stakeholders about how to execute the processes within the system (aka: agreement on the path to reach your desired outcome)?
• Is it clear to everyone what their role is?
• Do individuals understand how their role effects colleagues upstream and downstream from them, and how they can most effectively collaborate?

Once this foundation is established, you can start to consider the tools you might use.

Some questions to think on: