Deep Dive: The Case for Paper and Pen

Olivia Carter

Good afternoon, Mark. Today, we’re talking about something that, honestly, I’ve wrestled with for years—this obsession with finding the perfect note-taking app or system. Mark, I don’t know about you, but I’ve tried, like, every tool out there. Tablets, styluses, voice memos, AI summaries... I even had this phase where I thought if I just color-coded everything in Notion, my life would magically organize itself.

Mark Putnam

Oh, I’ve been there. I mean, I spent a good chunk of my CIO years convinced that the next upgrade—some new app, or a better cloud sync—would finally bring order to the chaos. But, you know, it’s funny. The more I optimized, the more scattered I felt. It’s like, all these tools promised clarity, but what I got was just... more stuff. More fragments. And, honestly, less control over what actually mattered.

Olivia Carter

Exactly! It’s like you’re chasing this feeling of being on top of things, but the more you capture, the less you actually remember. I read Tiago Forte’s Building a Second Brain, and it really hit me—notes aren’t supposed to be these endless archives. They’re supposed to help you act, or see something new, or just, I don’t know, make sense of the mess. But with digital tools, I was just hoarding, not thinking.

Mark Putnam

Yeah, and that’s the trap, right? You feel productive because you’re capturing everything, but you’re not actually distilling anything. It’s like, digital capture gives you this illusion of progress, but it rarely translates into real recall or direction. I think a lot of us in tech, or leadership, fall into that. We want sovereignty over our thoughts, but we end up outsourcing them to the cloud instead.

Olivia Carter

That's right.

Mark Putnam

So, here’s where it gets weird. After all those years of chasing the perfect system, I found myself going back to the most basic thing—a yellow legal pad. No battery, no syncing, no updates. Just paper. And, Liv, I gotta say, it was kind of a revelation.

Olivia Carter

Wait, really? Like, the classic legal pad? That’s so... analog. What changed for you?

Mark Putnam

Well, I realized that writing by hand forced me to make choices. You can’t write everything, so you have to decide what actually matters in the moment. I started doing this thing—one page per person, or per team, or per theme. After every conversation, I’d jot down just a few lines. Not a transcript, just what I needed to remember. And suddenly, things stopped slipping through the cracks. Commitments stuck. Action items stood out. It was like, the legal pad didn’t just catch information—it made me more reliable.

Olivia Carter

That’s wild. I mean, I always thought more tech meant more control, but you’re saying less is actually more. Did you ever feel like you were missing out by not having everything searchable or synced?

Mark Putnam

Honestly, not really. The discipline of having to choose what to write made the important stuff stick. And, weirdly, I remembered more—not less.

Olivia Carter

So, it’s not just about being organized, right? There’s something about handwriting that changes how you think. I’ve noticed when I write things out, my brain slows down. I start noticing things I’d miss if I was just typing—like, the way someone hesitates before agreeing, or the little side comments that actually matter.

Mark Putnam

That's right. The page becomes more than a container—it’s a thinking space. I’ll draw arrows, box things, scribble in the margins. It’s like, suddenly, my ideas have a shape. In leadership meetings, especially, that spatial thinking helps me see connections I’d totally miss in a linear transcript. The page kind of mirrors how my mind actually works—nonlinear, messy, but connected.

Olivia Carter

Yeah, and it’s almost like meta-cognition in motion. You’re not just taking notes, you’re reflecting as you go. I think that’s something digital tools just can’t replicate. They’re too frictionless, so you never have to slow down and actually process what’s happening.

Mark Putnam

Exactly. And that slowing down is where the real insight happens. You start to see the nuance—the stuff that actually drives decisions, not just the words that get said out loud.

Olivia Carter

Right.

Mark Putnam

You know, this reminds me of something Chris Voss talks about—tactical empathy. I went to one of his seminars, and he made this point that empathy isn’t about agreeing, it’s about really understanding the other person’s perspective. But you can’t do that if you’re toggling between apps or half-listening while you type.

Olivia Carter

Right, empathy needs friction. You have to be present, not just hearing but noticing. And writing by hand kind of forces that. You make fewer notes, but each one means more. You’re filtering, observing, picking up on the emotional temperature in the room. That’s where trust starts, honestly.

Mark Putnam

Yeah, and there’s this subtle thing—when someone sees you put pen to paper as they talk, it signals you’re really listening. You’re not performing, you’re not multitasking. That act alone builds trust. It’s a tactical advantage, sure, but it’s also just... human.

Olivia Carter

And the best ideas, or the most important questions, they’re usually the ones you scribble in the margins, not the official notes. That’s where collaboration actually happens—in those little moments of empathy, not in the bullet points.

Mark Putnam

That's right.

Olivia Carter

So, did you ever just leave your devices behind, like, on purpose? I feel like that’s a radical move these days.

Mark Putnam

Yeah, I started doing that for all my meetings and one-on-ones. Not because I’m anti-tech, but because I wanted to be fully present. No screen, no keyboard—just a pen and a pad. And it changed everything. I had to think as I wrote, synthesize as I listened. There was no hiding behind a transcript. It made me more responsible to the moment, not just a passive collector of information.

Olivia Carter

That’s so interesting. I think a lot of people would see that as less professional, but it’s actually the opposite. It’s like, you’re showing up with intention, not just with the latest gadget. And honestly, in a world where everyone’s distracted, that kind of attention is rare—and powerful.

Mark Putnam

Yeah, it’s not about rejecting technology. It’s about choosing when to use it. Sometimes, the most professional thing you can do is just pay attention—with a pen in your hand.

Olivia Carter

So how does this affect your ability to stay organized?

Mark Putnam

You know, Tiago Forte’s whole thing with Building a Second Brain is about capturing, organizing, distilling, and expressing information. But most people get stuck at the first step—they capture everything, but use almost nothing. Their digital systems become warehouses, not toolkits.

Olivia Carter

Yeah, I’ve totally been there. I’d save every article, every meeting note, thinking I’d use it later. But when everything’s saved, nothing stands out. It’s just noise. But with handwriting, you have to filter as you go. You’re already distilling at the point of capture. The legal pad becomes your first filter—your “first brain,” before anything even makes it to Notion or OneNote or whatever.

Mark Putnam

Exactly. And the surprise is, when you do move something to a digital system, it’s actually useful. You’ve already done the hard work of thinking. The digital archive becomes a toolkit, not a junk drawer. Forte says the value of a second brain is in how it helps you express and execute. That starts with the quality of what you capture—and there’s no better editor than a pen in your hand.

Olivia Carter

There’s actually research on this—Mueller and Oppenheimer’s study found that handwriting forces your brain to process and interpret, not just record. Even when laptop users tried not to transcribe, they still did, and their conceptual understanding was worse. So, it’s not just a feeling—writing by hand really does help you think deeper.

Mark Putnam

Yeah, for me, the legal pad became more than a tool. It was a mindset. It said, I’m not outsourcing my thinking to a device—I’m owning it, shaping it in real time. And that changed what it meant to be organized. It wasn’t about remembering more, it was about deciding more clearly, with more confidence and connection.

Olivia Carter

In a world obsessed with speed, slowing down is almost rebellious. But that’s how you sift signal from noise, intention from reaction. Sometimes, the answer isn’t a smarter app or a faster workflow. Sometimes, it’s just a legal pad, a pen, and the patience to pay attention.

Mark Putnam

Couldn’t have said it better. And, you know, as we’ve talked about in past episodes, sometimes the simplest solutions are the most transformative—if you’re willing to slow down and notice.

Olivia Carter

Alright, that’s it for today’s episode. Thanks for listening, everyone. Mark, always a pleasure.

Mark Putnam

Likewise, Liv. See you next time.

Olivia Carter

Take care, everybody. Stay present out there.