Are there any productivity hacks or tools that help you stay organized and on top of everything going on as a product manager?

Like anything in technology, iteration is key. There are constantly new tools, apps, and best practices coming out to help your productivity -  so you need to stay agile to continuously improve your own system. 

That being said, it's easy to get overwhelmed and overcomplicate your workflow. Having a baseline system that you fall back on can ensure nothing falls between the cracks. 

For me that is using a repeatable framework in how I approach problems, and managing a surprisingly simple and unstructured continuous to-do list - I add items as they come in, and delete them when complete or if they are no longer a priority.

I have a Notion board with three swimlanes - to-do, doing, and done.

I groom my to-do list about 3 times a day to ensure the highest prio stuff is next on the queue.

I to try to carve out dedicated blocks for complex, mentally-intensive work. I try not to little tasks (stuff that takes less than 5 min to do) build-up and intersperse them throughout my day.

I stay organized by setting half-yearly goals aligned with my manager. I like to break them down into monthly goals prioritized by impact, and track weekly progress, plans, and problems. This ensures alignment and helps me spot early signs of deviation from the original plan.

You can use a simple spreadsheet or leverage tools your company provides, but the core idea is to maintain visibility into progress and continuously tie short-term actions to long-term objectives. This practice keeps me focused and enables timely course corrections

PM work life is a firehose of Slack/Teams message, customer emails, meeting requests and deadlines. Here is what I find helpful to make sense of the chaos and stay on top of the key things.

• Capture, Organize, Get Shit Done. Resist the urge to jump on every message or email the same moment - you may find yourself exhausted while still behind on your goals. Instead, find a tool which lets you to quickly “capture” a thing which require your attention - and move on. Organize these to-dos thoughtfully - later, when you have time: what need to be done now, today, later this week? Some people find Eisenhower matrix framework helpful, though it may require much discipline and self-training to apply it to every day situations. My personal go-to solution for capturing and organizing PM to-dos is Trello.

• Meetings. Look at your calendar and brutally question it. Which meetings you don’t have to be in? Which ones you’d be fine just reading a summary after? Sometimes you’ll have to say “no” to get your work done, even if it slightly annoys someone.

• Async collaboration. A great way to reduce meetings load for me is Atlassian Loom: record a short video clip and share with your collaborators, let them responds or even with another video clip, async, at the time which works best for everyone!

• Focus time. Every week you likely have a Big Rock - a bit of work which isn’t immediately urgent, yet have an outsize importance and require significant focus time to accomplish. 

• Plan your week. Apply everything above to your Friday routine - plan your next week ahead. Meetings you’ll decline? Focus time you’ll block on your calendar - to accomplish most important tasks? 3 things (maximum) you are looking to accomplish next week?

• Plan your energy, not time. Lastly, recognize when you are at the peak of your productivity - late afternoon? mid-day? morning? Do your best to allocate this time to the most important things you are looking to accomplish. You are most productive on Fridays? Make it a no-meeting day to finish up that blog or product spec!

Not sure I would call them hacks, but I have various things I do to manage both my workload, product execution and overall team management.

1. ToDo List
   Goes without saying. Be organized and find a system that works for you. Pen and paper? Go for it. Trello board? Do it. Adoption Notion? Fire away. For me, it's been about finding what system works for me and being relentless with it. My memory is generally solid, but our roles as PMs mean we shift a lot ,and keeping track of things is the only way to be successful. You don't want to be known as the PM that people have to remind about asks over and over again.

2. Manage Your Calendar with Precision
   I manage my calendar carefully. I block the time that I need for things like responding to interruptions and checking in with various projects each day/week. Unless it's critical, I won't move those slots and that allows me to stay organized and on top of things.

3. Kanban for the Win
   I have been using a Kanban-style prioritization process for over a decade. Allows me to easily see what's in flight, what I need to keep an eye on, and at any given time, what is top of the pile to focus on. Lots of great tools for this, like Trello. I try and keep it simple with a backlog of items, what's in flight, and then what's done.

4. Automate to Success
   So many of our daily tools have automation capabilities that we can leverage to help with the simple things. The more "little things" I can take off my plate the better off I am to focus on the value-added things in my workload. Don't fall into the trap of "it's just easier for me to do it this time". If there is a way to invest a small amount of time to automate repetitive tasks or items.....do it.

Time management is essential as a PM, and the tools I use have changed over the years as I find what works. Here are some tips:

1. Use a project management tool: A project management tool, such as Asana or Trello, can help you keep track of tasks and progress you have for yourself. I always found it hard to follow up on tasks I delegated to others until I had a specific column in my Trello board dedicated to them.
2. Make use of templates: Use templates, such as meeting agendas or project planning documents, to save time and ensure that you consistently follow best practices. I have created many templates for PMs in my team to follow for interview guides, opportunity canvases, and decision documents. This lets us quickly get to the point of the document instead of needing to wade through the many variations in layout or formatting that can be distracting.
3. Use a note-taking tool: It can help you capture ideas and essential information and keep it organized. At the end of the day, I usually wonder where I put that note on a customer quote or OKR. If it's all in one place, it's easier to find!
4. Prioritize tasks: Use a prioritization method, such as the Eisenhower Matrix, to help you prioritize and focus on the most important things.
5. Take breaks: We all know we should do it but usually don't. Take breaks to rest and recharge, and try to avoid multitasking.
6. Use time blocking: Use time blocking to schedule dedicated blocks for specific tasks or projects, and try to minimize distractions during those blocks. This is invaluable, especially as a people leader with many 1:1s and meetings.