The 10-Point Notebook Setup Checklist for a New Project

A new project deserves better than opening a notebook at page one and hoping for the best. Ten minutes of preparation — an index, a few labelled sections, the reference details you would otherwise spend twenty minutes hunting for — turns a blank pad into a working tool. What follows is the checklist to run through whenever a notebook gets a new job, whether that is a client build, a course, a house move or the novel you keep promising yourself you will finish.

1. Set Up the Book Itself

Choose the notebook that suits the work. An A5 hardback with a ribbon suits something that travels in a bag. A4 gives you room for plans, floor sketches and sprawling diagrams. If you suspect you will want to reorder pages, add printouts or pull out a section entirely, go for a refillable ring binder or a discbound notebook. Dot grid is the most flexible ruling for people who draw as much as they write. Then commit to it. Half-set-up notebooks are the ones that get abandoned.

Claim the first page for the project facts. One page, nothing else on it. This is the page you will thank yourself for in three months. Include:

• The project name and a one-line description of what it actually is
• Who it is for, and who else needs to see it
• Key dates: start, checkpoints, the hard deadline
• Where the files live, written as a folder name or path rather than "in the usual place"
• Reference numbers, account codes, order or job numbers
• What finished looks like, in one sentence

If something is unknown, write TBC and a date to come back to it. A slot you revisit beats a page you avoid.

Number the pages as you go. If your notebook is not pre-numbered, spend a few minutes numbering the first twenty and the last ten pages, then keep numbering as you fill it. An index cannot point anywhere useful without page numbers. Put them in the bottom outer corner, and leave them visible when you tape in a receipt or a photo.

2. Build the Index Early

Reserve three or four pages for it. Front or back, it makes no difference as long as you are consistent. Two columns: topic, then page numbers. Adding a second number to an existing entry is easy. Rebuilding an index from scratch is not, and you will not do it.

Decide what deserves an entry. Not every page. Index the things you will genuinely go looking for later:

• Decisions, with the date and the reason behind them
• Meeting notes, listed by date and by who was there
• Reference material you had to look up twice
• Anything you would want to find in six months, not six days

Write the entry at the moment you create the page. Batching it at the end of the week sounds efficient and never happens.

3. Map Your Sections

Section the notebook around how the project works. Common candidates include meetings and calls, decisions and rationale, research, drafts and working notes, admin such as expenses and timesheets, and contacts. Write the section names into a contents list on page two, with the page they start on.

Leave room between sections. Use a sticky tab as a divider rather than drawing a hard line down the page, so a section that grows does not collide with the next one. Guessing the page allocations now and correcting them later is far better than setting up nothing at all.

Give actions a home. Keep a running list of next actions in one fixed place — the last few pages of the notebook work well, because you can flip to them with your thumb. One line per action, a checkbox, the date added, the date done. Rewrite the live list each week rather than carrying thirty half-finished items forward indefinitely.

4. Make Space for the Unfinished

Create a parking lot. Not every thought belongs in a section. Half-formed ideas, a phone number, a question to ask someone on Thursday, a title you might use — all of it goes onto one page near the back. Review that page weekly. This one habit is the best defence against a notebook turning into a scrapbook of loose ends.

Agree a shorthand with yourself. Draw a small key on the inside cover: a circle for an open question, a star for something important, an arrow for something to move elsewhere, a tick for done, a date in the margin for anything you may need to date later. Keep it to five or six symbols and use them consistently. You will remember your own key, which is exactly why it works.

5. Book In the Maintenance

Put a review in the calendar. Five minutes, same time each week. Update the index, empty the parking lot, transfer actions to where they belong, cross out what is finished, and write the date in the margin of the pages you touched. Skipping this is what separates a setup that lasts the length of the project from one that fades by week three.

When the project ends, write the finish date on the cover and store the notebook with the project files. Future you will be looking for it, and the project facts page will tell you everything you have forgotten.

The Ten-Point Checklist

1. Choose a notebook that fits how and where you will work
2. Fill in a project facts page
3. Number the pages, and keep numbering
4. Reserve three or four pages for an index
5. Decide what counts as an index-worthy entry
6. Map and label your sections, with room to grow
7. Give actions one fixed home
8. Add a parking lot for stray thoughts
9. Set a shorthand key on the inside cover
10. Schedule a five-minute weekly review

None of this takes long, and none of it needs to be perfect. Do it in one sitting before the work gets busy, and you will spend your time writing things down rather than trying to remember where you wrote them.

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