Digital Lab & Trials Experimenting with technology & craft

Improve your note taking and to-do lists with action method

November 15, 2011

This article is a brief description of a few great products that I love and use on a daily basis to maintain a productive and organized work day.  I know these products  may be common knowledge to a lot of people, especially in my industry, but for anyone else that isn’t aware of them, this article is for you.

What is Action Method?

Behance is the creator of multiple products to maximize your “action method,” a term they coined to improve the efficiency of your task management and written note taking abilities. One of those products is a free to use desktop and mobile application task manager called Action Method.

The application is simple and reflects their core beliefs in organization and workflow management. I think it fits in well among the other quality  To-do apps in the mobile market and is worth checking out. I won’t go into detail on this product so I will leave it to you to investigate further if electronic note taking is your area of interest. The next product line is where I think they have gone over the top in quality for task management.

Action Pads & Books

While the application is a great tool, especially for free, the real enjoyment I get out of their products come in the form of paper from their retail store, Creatives Outfitter.

A basic idea in physical note taking with a pen and paper over electronic note taking is the ability for the brain to have a stronger hold in maintaing that information in your mind due to the physical input from hand to paper. I completely agree with this and rely on paper products primarily for project note taking and every day memos.

Creatives Outfitter website has a good list of options that meet anyones needs. From small action cahier’s that can fit in your back pocket, to full page action pads that can be put into 3 ring binders.

Each piece of paper utilizes specific areas for organizing information. Smaller note pads like the one shown above are specifically for quick to-do lists with the back side having a dot grid print to use for just about anything else. Full size sheets, have a side column for task listing and the main column or organizing priority information at the top and general notes below. Here is a diagram from their website showing the layout as I described briefly above:

The Grid Dot Layout

As a Graphic & User Interface designer, the dot grid side of the paper is especially important to me. With the back side of each page having full use of this grid, it makes UI mockups easy and enjoyable. The fact that its a dot grid over a normal full line grid gives it less of a presence on the page while being equally useful for making straight lines. One thing I hate about a bad square grid paper is that the grid can add too much noise to your page if you are not using dark enough strokes from your pen or pencil. Here is an example that they showcase on their site of a UI specialist putting the paper to good use:

Maximize your note taking abilities

Note taking is nothing new, but Behance has tried to make it more enjoyable and productive with the use of these great informational layouts and products. Just the fact that these paper products look and work so amazing good, it motivates me to put extra effort into the quality notes I take as well as how I structure them in terms of importance. No yellow pad ever had that effect on the way I did task management!

I hope some people find this article helpful. Again, Behance has a lot of praise for their work and is loved by many, so for the few that are not aware of their product offerings, I recommend taking a look at it and seeing if it would improve the way you take notes and manage your tasks.