Personal Knowledge Management
What is a PKM?
Personal Knowledge Management (PKM) is the process of gathering information that a person uses to collect, categorize, store, search, retrieve, and share knowledge in their daily activities. As knowledge workers, we are constantly bombarded with new information every day. A well-implemented PKM can help us sift through the noise, retrieve relevant knowledge quickly and connect the dots between seemingly unrelated ideas to solve our present issue.
There are many ways to implement one's PKM, such as the Zettelkasten method and Building a Second Brain (BASD). These ideas are well-documented, and a Google search can point you to plenty of resources such as this which I am still taking time to digest.
Question-based PKM
While building my own digital garden, I started to have with the idea of a Question-based PKM. Walter's Questions is an implementation of this idea.
I think, one of the reasons why we read self-help book is because we are searching for answers or a different perspective on a particular situation we are facing. This is why books like How to Win Friends and Influence People that offers timeless advice remain popular to this day.
In other words, we constantly have questions in our minds that we seek answers to. Some of these questions are evergreen in nature; for example, questions like how to make better decisions or how to manage money remains relevant across life stages.
Hence, we can see these questions as giant umbrellas to compartmentalize our knowledge meaningfully. As we come across new ideas relevant to a particular big question, we can choose to include only those that we resonate with in our PKM. There will definitely be a time when there are conflicting advice, and this is where we should do our due diligence and keep the one that finds the most useful. Don't be afraid to challenge the old ideas that we have already regarded as "correct" in our PKM.
When implemented mindfully, I envision it as a directory of questions that people who look up to you will find very useful. It can work as a FAQ or AMA section for you to share your perspective on certain topics.
I will include more thoughts on this as I write Walter's Questions. Walter's Questions will serve as a central navigational note that links my other notes together in my digital garden.
Interesting Implementations
I included some of interesting implementations of a question-based PKM that I have discovered.
Dad, How Do I?
Rob Kenney's father left him and his brother as teenagers, now he has his YouTube channel called "Dad, how do I?” to help kids who’re growing up without dads. he teaches basic skills like tying a tie or fixing a toilet and his goal in life is to raise good adults—not good children but good adults—because he had a fractured childhood.
Tribe of Mentors
Tribe of Mentors is a book by Tim Ferris, in which he includes tools, tactics and habits from 130+ of the world's top performers. It is a compilation of answers based on the 11 questions he chose for the book.
Resources
You may find the list of links below useful: