Welcome to Issue #42 of Dave’s Productivity Newsletter (formerly Notion Creators), where I share 1 Big Idea & 3 Little Updates to help you work with more focus and intention.
QUICK NOTE
You may have noticed it’s been a while! The year kicked off with several new projects with clients, which I welcome, but was slightly unprepared for. I love writing this newsletter, so we’re condensing the format a bit. And when there’s more in depth resources to share, I’ll drop the links below so you can dive deeper if you wish. 😉
Where is Notion going? 🤔
It seems like there’s big news coming out of Notion every week. Between feature updates, acquisitions, and the rollout of Notion Calendar (formerly Cron), the Notion team clearly has their sights set on building a suite of products to better compete with Google and Microsoft.
As much as I like everything to be in one workspace, I can’t help but get excited about a future where your workspace taps into other tools – calendar, email, drives – where Notion is the main driver of productivity.
Especially when working with teams, we often hit a peak of what can be done in Notion. Turning an email into a task for instance, is pretty clunky and requires an automation tool like Zapier. Most teams still don’t use automations, though they seem to be getting more interested in the space.
With Notion’s acquisition of Skiff – a privacy-focused suite of tools – it’s clear the next big update will come in the form of either an email or messaging platform.
Personally, I think email is the big missing piece. Teams who have mastered Notion for internal productivity still rely on email for external communication. Being able to build stronger connections between email and key workspace actions like project management would be a huge value-add.
What do you think about Notion’s goals for building out a library of tools? I’ve definitely heard from users (and consultants) that it feels like Notion is moving away from its original mission of ‘building a tool to make tools.’ Curious to get your thoughts on it!
NOTION UPDATE
You can finally move tabs! 🔁
Are you also irrationally excited about this update, or are you normal? 😂
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve switched from my browser to Notion, and tried failed to slide tabs left and right. I love that Notion’s picked up speed with these little quality-of-life updates. Keep going!
FROM THE COMMUNITY
Turning Notion Databases into Charts 📈
This comes up a lot with clients. The ability to display databases in views like lists, galleries, or boards is nice, but often users just want to see data in a chart form.
Since Notion hasn’t taken this on, there have been a few exciting tools that do it for you, like Rows.
Matthias Frank goes into detail on how to turn a Notion database into a chart here!
NOTION CONSULTANT CORNER
Big News Coming for Notion Consultant Bootcamp 🎓
We’ve been hard at work planning our 2nd cohort, which kicks off in April. I am incredibly excited for this, as we’ve made some big updates to the content, and secured several guest speakers that are at the top of their game. If you’re exploring Notion consulting, sign up below to get updates and first access when enrollment opens. 🙂
🙌🏼 That’s it for this week!
I’d love to hear what you think. What content resonates? What do you want to see more or less of? Just hit reply to let me know!
And if you’re loving this newsletter, I’d love it if you helped spread the word! 😀