The RNDM: Longform

Hello and welcome to The RNDM: Longform, a weekly newsletter which consists of articles written by the RNDM team.

Each week we'll aim to share more in-depth articles written by our team on the same interesting topics as we cover in our usual newsletter.

Please let us know what you think of this new format. Did you like it? Would you change anything? Feedback is a gift so let us know by replying to the email or leave a comment below.

The Future is Now: Embracing AI as a Game-Changer for Knowledge Workers

As a knowledge worker, you likely spend hours on mundane tasks like scheduling, email management, and data entry. But what if I told you that there's a tool that can automate these tasks and free up your time to focus on more creative and complex work? That tool is artificial intelligence (AI).

AI is not only capable of automating repetitive tasks, but it can also help you sift through vast amounts of information, facilitate collaboration with colleagues across time zones and languages, and provide real-time insights and recommendations. With AI-powered analytics tools, you can identify patterns and trends in data, making informed decisions and finding new opportunities.

Of course, some people are concerned about the impact of AI on human jobs. But I believe that AI will augment the capabilities of knowledge workers, rather than replace them altogether. By partnering with AI, you can achieve even greater levels of productivity and efficiency, making strides towards success in your field.

So, embrace the rise of AI as a major development for knowledge workers. Leverage its power to automate mundane tasks, enhance your research and analysis capabilities, and collaborate seamlessly with your colleagues. With AI as your ally, you can work smarter and achieve even greater success.

Beyond the Brain: Unleashing Your Superpower through Personal Knowledge Management

You have a superpower that you use every day and you don't even know it.

You can expand your mind beyond the limitations of your body into your environment.

Sound strange?

But It's true. Plus it's proven by science.

The Extended Mind Theory suggests that your thinking is not solely confined to your brain, but expands and is enhanced by your environment. Through the use of tools such as a calculator, a spreadsheet or a smartphone, you're expanding your cognition to allow your brain to function better.

Research has shown that certain aspects of thinking can be passed to external tools to allow you to think better and improve problem solving.

Technology is one of the best examples of this in action. When you use your phone to save a number, you're extending your storage and retrieval into the phone. When you use a spreadsheet for data analysis, you're extending your cognition to aid problem-solving. By externalising or visualising, you're able to process more information which allows you to think better and make better decisions.

So how can a Personal Knowledge Management (PKM) system unleash this power?

Using a PKM system allows you to spread the cognitive work across the brain and external tool, such as a note taking app or a To Do list app. Through your external collection and organisation of knowledge you offload storage to free up your mind so you can process more information, and think more creatively which can lead to better ideas and effective problem-solving.

I use Obsidian for my knowledge management system, but there are many different applications you can use. The reason I find Obsidian works best for me is the backlinks and graph view. Backlinks allow you to link notes to one another and the graph view allows you to visualise these as a network of linked notes. The graph view is a further example of how you can expand your thinking through visualisation. Viewing each note on the graph can help you discover new connections between topics that you wouldn't have linked together otherwise.

There's plenty of guidance on setting up your own knowledge management system on the internet, but I would recommend learning from Tiago Forte and the Linking Your thinking on Youtube. They both have easy to follow videos on starting your knowledge management system and building upon it.

Do you use a knowledge management system?

Let me know in the comments. I'm always looking for ideas on how to improve my system.

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Thanks again for your support and see you again next week.