Planning & executing

Posted by Prion
Aug 9, 2021 at 06:59 AM

I am in the academics, too, and will follow this topic with interest as you describe a common problem.

First off, although the ability to stick to a plan has a mostly positive connotation generally I am convinced that some of what you describe is inevitable. As you familiarise yourself with a (to you!) new subject, you realise that at least some aspects of it have been researched earlier, perhaps in other contexts and this insight has the power to modify your initial view - as it by all means should! You should be proud of first familiarising yourself with the work to others. It has become customary in my field to cut corners here and largely ignore everything that cannot be found by half an hour of googling around. It is not only and perhaps not even primarily laziness but a perverted system of never-ending cycles of hectic grant writing, rejections and resubmissions that are only very occasionally being reviewed by someone more familiar with the research subject that penalises a deeper familiarisation methinks.

Anyway, I have a similarly disordered digital workflow in that respect and cannot offer a software that would magically solve it all. I am constantly thinking about doing things differently but that open-mindedness can become a liability, too. One of the better books on that subject is Sönke Ahrens’ “How to take smart notes” which I found to be quite insightful.
https://takesmartnotes.com

The one thing I can add here is that good old analog life has had the most positive effect in keeping me on course. Either pen and paper or in the last years an erasable whiteboard that I salvaged when those were replaced by digital ones in our institute. On this I have the names of the students I am supervising (which keeps me from forgetting about the external ones that I don’t see very often), collaborators and project titles that move up and down in relation to their relative importance for the day or week. There is enough space to jot down a quick insight or paper that I need to read and the best part is that everything is there in relative permanency, no booting up, no need to remember to open a particular program or file. Whenever my mind begins to wander, that whiteboard is there and drifts into sight. The title of each project at least ensures that despite modifications along the way there is at least some continuity in my thinking.

Sorry if that is not precisely what you have been asking for but it is the best I can offer for now.