Hey everyone!
So, we understand that our brains are so full of stuff we keep forgetting. It is easy to be drowning in sticky notes and forgotten bookmarks.
That's why we're here to introduce you to a game-changer: PKM or personal knowledge management tools! Discover the top 10 we have picked up for you. Trust us, your future self will thank you for it!
1. What is a personal knowledge management system?
A personal knowledge management system or PKM tool is like a digital notebook or filing cabinet for your brain. It helps you keep track of all the stuff you want to remember - like notes, articles, web links, and more. You can organize everything neatly, tag it for easy searching, and find what you need in a snap.
It's basically a handy tool to help you manage and access your personal knowledge and information whenever you need it. Examples of personal knowledge management tools include apps like Microsoft OneNote, Notion, SaveDay, etc.
2. What is the difference between PKM and PIM?
Curious about PKM vs. PIM? Let's break it down. Knowing the difference helps tame your info overload and keeps life organized.
Personal Knowledge Management (PKM)
- PKM helps you organize and understand the things you learn and know.
- It's like having a system to organize your thoughts, ideas, and notes to make sense of them.
Personal Information Management (PIM)
- PIM helps you manage your day-to-day stuff like emails, calendars, contacts, and files.
- You can find tools to keep track of your schedule, tasks, and personal information.
In short, personal knowledge management tools manage what you know, while PIM is about managing your daily life and information.
3. Why is personal knowledge management important?
Ever feel like your brain's playing hide and seek with your own thoughts? Ever wished your brain came with an “easy-find” button? That's the magic of personal knowledge management tools! Discover why it can be your brain's BFF to save the day.
- Stay organized: With personal knowledge management tools, organize all your information and ideas in one place for easy access.
- Avoid overwhelm: Sort through the massive amount of information available on personal knowledge management tools to focus on what's important.
- Boost productivity: Save time by quickly finding the information you need without searching endlessly.
- Support learning: Personal knowledge management tools capture, organize, and review information in a way that makes sense to you.
- Enhance decision-making: Have the right information at your fingertips to make informed decisions.
- Encourage creativity: Use personal knowledge management tools to connect ideas and information to spark new insights and innovations.
- Build expertise: Deepen your understanding and become an expert in your field over time.
- Collaborate effectively: Share your organized knowledge with others on personal knowledge management tools for better collaboration and teamwork.
- Adapt to change: Personal knowledge management tools help you stay flexible and adaptable by continuously updating and refining your knowledge.
- Promote self-awareness: Reflect on your knowledge to better understand your strengths, weaknesses, and areas for growth.
4. How do you organize your personal knowledge base?
Organizing a personal knowledge base can be highly individualized. It depends on your preferences, the type of information you're managing, and how you plan to use it. However, here are some general steps and tips to help you get started with personal knowledge management tools:
Step 1: Define your goals
Figure out why you're making your knowledge base. Is it for school, work, or just for fun?
Start your personal knowledge management journey by listing the projects you're currently working on. Focus on what's most important to you, covering about a week's worth of work.
Consider breaking your work into projects rather than areas of responsibility. This helps generate motivation and novelty, essential for long-term engagement.
Whether you're a note-taker or a resource collector, choose a personal knowledge management tool that suits your approach.
Step 2: Pick your personal knowledge management tools
Choose where you'll put your stuff. Personal knowledge management tools nowadays offer many different features. But don't commit to a tool before testing it fully.
If you use a wide variety of knowledge sources, consider an app like SaveDay, which saves and organizes everything in one place. It also offers connected note-taking features for deep note-takers.
If you're managing notes in a shared team setting, Notion's wiki-style app could be ideal. For marking up sources, Evernote with its web clipper may suit you.
Step 3: Start collecting and sorting things out
Decide what kinds of things you'll keep, like notes or articles. You can add anything you think is interesting or useful to personal knowledge management tools. Then, make tags or put your stuff into collections for them, like "School" or "Hobbies".
Step 4: Keep it clean
Check your stuff now and then to make sure it's still good. Get rid of things you don't need anymore, and fix anything that's wrong.
Step 5: Find what you need
Use the search feature on personal knowledge management tools to find things quickly. Also, try linking similar things together to make them easier to find.
Step 6: Keep copies
Save your stuff in more than one place, just in case something goes wrong. You can back it up on your desktop or on your personal knowledge management tools.
Step 7: Keep improving
Your knowledge base can change as you learn new things or find better ways to organize. Don't be afraid to change it up!
Habits like these are crucial for effective personal knowledge management. Cultivate habits especially for capturing knowledge and cleaning up obsolete information or old projects. Many PKM tools out there can help, such as SaveDay with its browser tab-saving feature to easily capture knowledge.
5. What tools can be used for personal knowledge management?
Discover our top list of 10 best personal knowledge management tools. They're your ticket to staying sane in a world of info overload. You will certainly need these in your life!
- Best for: Instantly saving, organizing, and retrieving content in various forms.
- Key features: Content saving in any format, reminders for saved content, web highlighter and Quoteshots, annotation, AI content summarizer, intuitive search, sidebar access.
- Best for: Small organizations needing a flexible personal knowledge management tool for task management.
- Key features: Customizable workflows, integrations, dashboard, structured knowledge base.
- Best for: Organizations wanting to centralize collective knowledge.
- Key features: Simple editor, integrations, browser extension, expert verification, Slack integration.
- Best for: Creating a centralized workspace for collaboration.
- Key features: Pages & project plans, Jira integration, advanced search, real-time editing.
- Best for: Software development and technical problem-solving.
- Key features: Private knowledge base, content health, chatops integrations, structured knowledge base.
- Best for: Comprehensive project management and productivity.
- Key features: Project management, real-time chat, dashboard views, collaboration tools.
- Best for: Creating and maintaining customer-focused knowledge bases.
- Key features: Knowledge base site, workflow management, reporting, collaboration tools.
- Best for: Centralizing collective knowledge for easy access.
- Key features: Content import, feedback system, notifications, file syncing.
- Best for: Real-time collaboration on documents and projects.
- Key features: Drag and drop editor, project management, searchability, integrations.
- Best for: Team collaboration on documents and projects.
- Key features: Flexible editor, collaborative cursors, discussions dashboard, integrations.
