I have over 10,000 notes in my Evernote account, including everything from work to-do lists, goals, and meeting materials to bills and my children’s artwork. That may sound like a jumbled nightmare, but I’ve figured out how to make it all work for me.
我的Evernote账户里有一万多张便条，包括从工作任务清单、目标、会议材料到账单和孩子们的艺术品。这听起来像是一场混乱的噩梦，但我已经知道如何让它为我工作。

 
After all, it would be a shame if I couldn’t. As the CEO of Evernote, it’s my job to help others control information overload and gain back a little more time in the process. Here are a few of the ways I’ve learned to stay organized and productive, both inside Evernote and in the wider world.
毕竟，如果我不能，那就太遗憾了。作为Evernote的首席执行官，我的职责是帮助其他人控制信息过载，并在这个过程中节省时间。以下是我学会在Evernote和职场中里保持条理性和高效率的几种方法。
 
ASSIGN EACH WEEKDAY A THEME
给每个工作日制定工作主题
It’s easy to get sucked into an endless cycle of emails and obligations. To avoid falling into this trap, I assign a “theme” that I focus on each day.
人们很容易陷入无休止的电子邮件和工作任务的循环中。为了避免落入这个陷阱，我给每天都分配了一个“主题”。
 
Mondays are for taking care of the business side of Evernote. This typically involves weekly leadership meetings and one-on-ones with my team, where I help solve problems, move things forward, and discuss ideas about how to innovate or move faster.
星期一是用于管理Evernote的业务的。这通常包括每周一次的领导会议和一对一的团队合作，在那里我可以帮助解决问题，推动事情向前发展，并讨论如何创新或更快地行动。
 
Tuesdays are blocked off for a weekly all-hands meeting with the entire company, including our global offices, which join via video stream. This meeting is about celebrating our employees and their accomplishments as well as ensuring we’re all on the same page when it comes to our strategy and long-term mission.
周二，整个公司，包括通过视频流加入我们的全球办公室都要参加全体大会，回顾员工成就，以及确保我们在战略和长期任务上的一致性。
 
Wednesdays are reserved for marketing and our go-to-market efforts. We’re lucky because most of Evernote’s growth is organic and happens through word of mouth. I typically devote Wednesdays to planning how to put that user feedback into action. For instance, last year, our Android users were very vocal about wanting a fingerprint-scanning feature, so we prioritized it in the roadmap and built it for them. That was a Wednesday project.
星期三的主题是市场营销和开拓市场。我们很幸运，因为Evernote的大部分增长都是有机的，而且是通过口碑传播的。我通常会在周三花时间规划如何将用户的反馈付诸行动。例如，去年，我们的Android用户非常想要一个指纹扫描功能，所以我们把它放在了路线图中，并为他们构建了它。那是一个星期三的项目。
 
I split Thursdays between product and recruiting. This is when I’ll typically do a deeper dive into our product roadmap and examine the progress we’re making. We’re actively recruiting across all functions and regions, so I also spend Thursdays meeting candidates and partnering with our People team to run a smooth hiring and onboarding process.
周四的主题是产品和招聘。这时，我通常会深入研究我们的产品路线图，并检查我们正在取得的进展。我们所有的职能部门和地区正在积极地招聘，所以我也会在周四的时候与我们的员工进行会面，并与我们的团队合作，以顺利完成招聘过程。
 
And finally, on Fridays, I handle anything that didn’t get done earlier in the week. I also use Friday afternoons to reflect back on the week and prepare for what’s to come in the week ahead.
最后，在周五，我处理了本周早些时候没有完成的事情。我也用周五下午的时间来回顾上一周，为接下来的一周做准备。
 
Of course, I know there will be times when I go off track–it’s bound to happen. But organizing my week thematically at least gives me a plan to stick to.
当然，我知道有时我也会偏离轨道——这一定会发生。但至少每周采取这种计划能鼓励我坚持下去。
 
PLAN AHEAD AND PRIORITIZE
提前做好计划
I probably oversee about nine different Google calendars (which are, of course, integrated into Evernote) that reflect the different roles in my life: Some are for work, others are for travel and my personal obligations, and others cover my kids’ sports schedules.
我可能会监督9个不同的谷歌日历(当然，这些日历会被集成到Evernote中)，它们反映了我生活中不同的角色:有些是工作，有些是旅行和我的个人义务，还有一些是我孩子们的体育日程。
 
I set up my work calendars to take into account what my quarterly goals are for myself and my team–this way I can see that I’m making an impact over the long term. I also make sure I have enough time to achieve everything my team and I planned to do day-to-day.
我设立了我的工作日程表，考虑到我的季度目标对我自己和我的团队来说是什么，这样我就能看到这样做的长期影响。我还确保我有足够的时间来完成我的团队和我计划每天做的事情。
 
RESIST LETTING EMAILS DICTATE THE WORKDAY
不要让邮件占满了整个工作日
As a rule, I try to resist checking my email first thing in the morning. Instead, I consult my #TomorrowList, which I write the night before. This list simply spells out my top three priorities for the day, in order of importance. I try to tackle the hardest problem that requires the most energy and creativity first, to get it out of the way.
一般来说，我在早上第一件事就是拒绝查看邮件。我会参考我的“明天清单”，这是我前一天晚上写的。这个列表简单地列出了我一天中最重要的三件事，按重要性排序。我试图解决最困难的问题，因为这些问题需要最大的精力和创造力。
 
It’s been said that your email inbox is other people’s to-do list for you, and I feel like that’s certainly true. I try to check my email just twice a day, and use a modified version of the Getting Things Done (GTD) method in order to stick to that. I’ve also set up automatic filters to reroute emails to the appropriate folders.
有人说你的电子邮件收件箱是别人的待办事项，我觉得这是真的。我试着每天检查我的邮件两次，并使用修改版的get Things Done (GTD)方法来坚持这一点。我还设置了自动过滤器，将电子邮件重新路由到适当的文件夹。
 
I have two simple rules for dealing with email:
处理邮件的两条原则：
1. If it takes two minutes or less, I deal with it immediately.
如果一两分钟就能解决，那就立刻解决。
2. Everything else, I route to someone else on my team or send to my Evernote to deal with later. Otherwise I just archive it.
如果耗时过长，我会转交给团队来处理或者记录在Evernote中稍后处理。
 
KEEP MEETINGS TO A MINIMUM
精简会议
My teams used to hold biweekly status updates with dozens of people, but I realized this was a waste of everyone’s time. Now, I limit meetings to eight people and maintain a “no agenda, no attendance” policy: If the meeting host doesn’t share an agenda beforehand that makes it clear what the meeting is for and what they need, I don’t attend. For the meetings that I do attend, I make sure there’s a designated notetaker who can later share their notes and action items afterward.
我的团队过去常常和几十个人保持每两周开一次会的频率，但我意识到这是在浪费每个人的时间。现在，我把会议限制在8个人，并保持“没有议程，没有出席”的政策:如果会议主持人事先没有分享议程，解释会议的目的，那我就不参加了。在我参加的会议上，我要确保有一个指定的记录员，之后可以分享他们的笔记和行动项目。
 
Taken together, this approach works for me, but everybody’s different. Still, I believe that there’s no such thing as an inherently productive or unproductive person–there are just methods that improve how well you work, or don’t. The key is finding the right combination for you.
总的来说，这种方法对我有效，但每个人都不一样。尽管如此，我认为没有人是生来就可以保持高效率工作的——有一些方法可以提高你的工作效率。关键是找到合适的方法。