Using Evernote to track daily project requests and tasks

For years I did project-based work. There were set beginning and end dates, and I knew exactly what needed to be done, and when it absolutely had to be complete. I tend to work better that way.
Recently, my position at work changed, and instead of doing project work, I’m working on two ongoing projects with daily tasks. When I first started working this way, it was a mess. I multitasked myself into an inefficient, maniacal, ADD-riddled mess. I knew I needed to develop a system to keep myself grounded in the new work environment, so I turned to Evernote. I used it for all my project work, so it made sense that I could use it for daily work.

Instead of one notebook per project, I created a few notebooks for each of my two ongoing projects.

1. Basic Project Notebook
   1. Here, I kept all my notes, manuals, guidelines, meeting notes, etc. It’s a catch-all for the project.
2. ToDo
   1. As requests/tasks came in (they’re usually emailed to me,) they went from Outlook straight into the ToDo folder. The beauty of doing this in Evernote is that all attached images/files/etc. can be stored in the task note, as well.
3. Done
   1. Once a task is finished, I move it to the Done notebook. This serves two purposes:
   1. It keeps my ToDo notebook from getting too cluttered
   2. It allows me to have a “log” of all completed requests. If someone wants to know when a particular task was completed, I can just search my Done notebook and tell them. (I usually add the completed date to the top of a note when moving it into the Done folder.
4. Log Notebook (this notebook covers all work projects)
   1. In addition to each project’s Done notebook, I keep an actual log of tasks completed. It’s a 4-column table in a note titled with the date.
   2. There’s one completed task per row, and somewhere in that row is a note link that references the task note.
   3. Each day, I start a new log note, recreate the table, and keep track of requests I’ve handled.

I still love to use Remember the Milk for everyday tasks, or any recurring tasks I may have, but for work, Evernote has proven to be a more efficient way of keeping track of everything.