Personal Knowledge Management is a bit.. vague.

Effective management will depend on what you are managing.

So let us get more specific:

• Idea Management
• Data Management
• Action Management
• Output Management
• Reference Management
• Relationship Management 1/ Idea Management is the management of knowledge that comes directly from your mind.

You can't just "clip" your thoughts.

Instead, you need to express them.

Ideas relate to your observations, your data, and your sources, but they are not "the source" or "the quote".

Give me 3 minutes and I'll give you 10 note-taking tips to triple your production of ideas. New ideas are produced by combining old ones and giving them a personal twist.

And the best way to access old ideas is by writing them down.

Here are a few tips on how to use note-taking to create new ideas.

Chat GPT can save you 1000s of hours of research

Let’s explore why. The first step in ANY research project is to learn the basics about a research area:

- How do other people call your research topic?
- Who are the key people in the area?
- What are the key venues for publication?
- Has the area been growing or shrinking?

If you’ve ever spent months researching only to stare at a blank page when it’s time to write, you need to employ this process: 1/ Write down your ideas as they happen

Most people keep their ideas in their minds only.
So when it is time to write up, the details of these ideas are gone!

I say we should ‘write through’ our ideas as they happen.
So when it is time to write, the ideas are already written.

The biggest challenge for research-driven writers:

Organisation of sources.

People who fail to organise their sources need to search for a paragraph among 100s of papers usually in a deadline-driven *panic*.

Here are 5 levels of reference management you can choose from. 1/ Folder-based Reference Management

"The Dumpster"

You throw all your sources into a Project folder and hope for the best.

When it is time to find the source again, you forgot the source title and you feel like searching through a dumpster.

7 reasons why most note-taking fails. 1/ You take notes but never read them again.

What are your notes for?

If they are just quick jots for short-term memory, that's fine to toss them away.

But if notes are for long-term memory and knowledge creation, then they should be reused often.

Visual organisation of notes is an area of PKM that is heating up.

Now that @obsdmd has launched Canvas, I think it is time to do a very quick comparison with @scrintal

Here are some of the basic features side by side. @obsdmd @scrintal 1/ Creating a new Visual Space.

The basis of visually organising notes is having a visual space where to work on.

The biggest enemy of content creators:

Writer's block.

Some people spend *months* developing their knowledge — when it is time to write, it is gone!

Here are 5 types of writer's block and how to solve them. Most people believe that the writing process consists of 2 phases:

- Writing
- Editing

That's not true. It has 3:

- Pre-writing
- Drafting
- Editing

Pre-writing is where we formulate and organise the ideas in preparation for writing.

6 websites to help you find (and analyse) the right academic literature. 1/ Google Scholar

Just like Google search, but for academic papers.

Use it to:

- Find free PDF copies of papers
- See other papers from same author
- Quickly check the citations network

scholar.google.com

3 simple methods to manage the connections between your notes and the literature. 1/ One note per source

This is the most basic method (and the least effective).

- Create a new note for each source
- Write each idea as a subheading

Now that @tana_inc is making "ontologies" (aka schemas or Linked Data) known.

Here are some examples of where you can also find schemas in use. @tana_inc 1/ Wikipedia

Wikipedia is the test bed for everyone starting on Linked Data.

See that box at the corner?

That's structured content.

In Wikipedia you can attach that to a full page. In @tana_inc you can attach that to multiple blocks.

The most powerful habit for solving scattered thoughts:

Writing notes.

Most people go their *entire* lives consuming information without making sense of what they learn — when they notice, their knowledge is gone.

Here are 6 sensemaking strategies you can use today. 1/ Freewriting

"Write it down as it comes to mind"

Don't bullet point.
Don't stop to "reflect".

Instead, write all thoughts exactly as they come to mind.

With a written note containing ALL your thoughts, you can then start organising and making sense of them.

Starting in 10 minutes..

and.. I will be live tweeting! 🐦

https://twitter.com/NickMilo/status/1567180858053861377

So.. what is the difference between Zettelkasten and LYT @thehighpony?

Started now.. and I will be livetweeting 😉

https://twitter.com/NickMilo/status/1567165770714554369

Anne-Laure (@anthilemoon) talks about the generation effect:

By generating your own version of the content you will remember and understand it better.

A.K.A. Don't just highlight my friends!

Starting in a couple of minutes..

And I will be livetweeting 😉

https://twitter.com/NickMilo/status/1567158184904638467

Note making is to just capture other people's words.

Usually driven by FOMO = Fear of Missing Out

What is the best Note Making tool?

The best for someone else does not mean the best for YOU

So, how to choose the best tool for you? 🧵👇 1. Focus on the mindset first

What is your way of thinking?

Do you like to write bullet points or you prefer freewriting your thoughts?

Do you want to quickly quote a source or prefer to write your own thoughts?

How long does it take for knowledge to compound?

A year or less..

.. with Linking Your Thinking (a testimonial tweet storm)
⛈👇 My research career was thriving.

After quitting my PhD at the 3rd year, I learned which (soft) skills I should be looking for.

One of them?
Project Management.

Everyone has just attended the same presentation. Now..

It is networking time!

How can we avoid conversation starters like "did you like the presentation?" that end in "yes, it was nice"?

Solution: Note making

🧵👇 Note taking is to take notes of what was said during the presentation.

🗒 Note making is more than that!

Note making is to connect your own thoughts and experiences to what is being said. It is to create links with what no one else in the room has heard.

But how to do it?

How do you organise your research notes?

Here are some reflections on my current academic workflow.

A 🧵 of threads 👇

https://twitter.com/bianca_oli_per/status/1414859331133222917?s=19

From notes to publication.

My knowledge management workflow (Part 4 - Creation)

🧵👇 The first (and hardest) step in building a publication is to create the argument (or "line of thinking").

Having linked notes about:
- the studied literature
- the results of analysis and experiments
- personal insights

already provide the building blocks for the argument.

It is important to separate what comes from the literature and our own contributions.

My knowledge management workflow (Part 3 - Development)

🧵👇 We need to be able to demonstrate our contributions in each paper.

This may be harder when the contribution is purely conceptual.

"How to separate what is already in the literature from what we have created?"