TCW #020 | How I use Notion to manage my projects as a career coach (and as a chief product officer)
It starts with a vision and ends with weekly reflection. The stuff in the middle doesn't have to be tedious.
This month, The Career Whispers is focused on helping you thrive in your tech job.
This week, I’ll share my approach to managing my work as a career coach, which also happens to be how I manage my work as a chief product officer.
Let’s dive in.
What’s all the fuss about Notion
I’ve lived in Google Docs since college, and I’m super efficient at setting up docs and spreadsheets for organizing my work. Yet, last summer I wanted to give Notion a try.
Here’s what I’ve found so far:
Notion is great for high-level project management, task management, and goal tracking, but there are some real limitations when it comes to visualizing your results.
The good news is that Notion just launched a much improved project management template today, and it helps with a lot of the things that used to be, well, hard.
Note: I’m not paid or endorsed by Notion. I just want to share what I do in Notion to help you manage your work better.
How I manage my work
Before I show you how I use Notion to manage my work as a chief product officer and for my coaching business, first I’ll share my general approach.
It starts with an Annual Vision
This is fairly simple. I write out what I need my product, team, or business to look like by the end of the year.
Example:
…which I break into Quarterly Goals
Most of the bullets in the vision end up having separate, measurable goals assigned to them. Some principles for goal-setting that work for me:
Quarterly, not monthly or annually. I generally set quarterly goals because it’s enough time to make progress without overdoing it on overhead (of measurement).
Measurable. Each goal has a target (some quantifiable value).
Simple. I make an effort to make my goals simple. This is for my own benefit as well as for communicating the goals to external audiences as needed.
Every month, I update the values so the progress field (a calculated field) can help me visualize the progress.
Example:
…then decompose into discrete efforts (projects) and tasks
Some rules of thumb that I use:
Brainstorm the tasks at once. Try to be comprehensive.
Bite-size tasks for momentum building. For my 1-person coaching business, tasks should be no longer than 2-3 days; otherwise I break them down. For my CPO work, I set a max of 1 week. Momentum is everything.
Dates at the end. Add dates only after exhaustively adding the tasks. Why? It’s tedious and better to do it once than rework them every time you remember a new task that goes in the middle.
Focus on content over format: don’t worry too much about dependencies and visualizations, especially if you’re doing this for your own benefit.
Example
Lastly, I use a weekly reflection to keep myself honest about the Top 3 projects on my plate (and to reflect on changing priorities and approaches)
It’s one thing to get all of your projects down on paper. For me, it’s a relief to see it all in one place and to have reasonable timelines assigned to each task — much better than storing it all in my brain.
It’s a whole other thing to be strategic about what work you do, when. It’s important to adapt your priorities to reflect new information, not just blindly follow your initial plans.
To keep my prioritization fresh, I do a weekly reflection where I systematically review my priorities and set new priorities for the following week.
Here’s how I do it:
Metacognition is a super food for strategic thinking, and it has transformed the effectiveness of my personal and professional prioritization. And it only takes 10 minutes per week!
I created a free template you can use to start weekly reflections for yourself, even if you don’t have a disciplined approach to planning your projects and efforts on an annual, quarterly, or even monthly basis.
Starting with reflection is a great starting point.
Grab the free weekly reflection template here.
🎉 That’s a wrap! Give this a try and let me know how it goes.
Subscribe to stay tuned!
When you're ready, there are 3 ways I can help you:
→ First Round Ready Course — An affordable 77-minute course that offers the exact job search and interview prep tools, frameworks, and skills that landed 93% of my clients into their dream roles and tech companies…plus it comes with a Quick Wins interview prep workbook to immediately translate your learning into action.
→ 1:1 Job Search Coaching — I offer packaged bundles with pay-for-performance pricing so you know our incentives are aligned, and we win together when you ace your interviews. I also offer on-demand 1:1 sessions that you can book up to 4 weeks out, with a minimum of 24hr notice. Check out my testimonials.
→ Resume Glow Up — I fully transform your resume to tell your career story more powerfully and land you more interviews. The resulting resume is optimized for applicant tracking systems (ATS) and for human readers alike. I will also Fairy Godmother your LinkedIn profile to get you more inbounds and more traction with recruiters and interviewers.