Why Documentation Saves Time

I Have Wasted a Lot of Time Doing Genealogy

I have wasted a lot of time doing genealogy.

Not because I wasn’t researching.  I was.  In fact, I was doing a lot of research I shouldn’t have been doing.

I’ve searched for records I’d already found.  I’ve searched record sets I’d already searched.  I’ve come back to research after some time away and realized I couldn’t remember exactly what I’d done—or sometimes whether I’d done it at all.

And I wish I could tell you I only did these things once.

I didn’t.

It took me a long time to learn that the few minutes I thought I was saving by not documenting my research could cost me hours later.

So if I can save you from making some of the same mistakes I’ve made, let me show you why documentation really does save time.

You Won’t Remember Everything

One thing that’s obvious to me now—but wasn’t when I first started researching—is that I need to document my research.

When you’re only working with your first one to five names and you have a decent memory, it’s easy to think, Oh, I don’t have to write everything down.  I can just remember.

And maybe you can—for a while.

When I was younger, I thought I could hold information about 20 people in my head.  But I found out pretty quickly that there’s a danger zone.  As you start researching more and more people, eventually you think you remember something correctly when you don’t.  You start confusing people, details, and information.

That’s when relying on your memory starts costing you time.

Stop Doing the Same Research Twice

One of the most frustrating things about not documenting my research was how often I duplicated my own work.

I’d find a document, download a digital copy, go to save it—and realize I’d already saved it before.  I just hadn’t written down that I’d found it.  So I’d spent an hour finding a document I’d already found.

The same thing can happen with an entire search.  Maybe you’re looking for a birth or marriage record and find a record set that covers the right place and dates.  You think, Oh, fantastic! This is wonderful.  Surely I’ll find it in here.

Except you searched that same record set a month ago.

If you don’t have a record of what you’ve already searched, how are you going to remember what you did a month ago?  Or a year ago?  Or three years ago?

And that brings us to something even more important: how do you know you’re not wasting your time?  Time is the one resource we don’t get back.

I’ve learned through the school of very, very hard knocks that if you don’t document where you’ve been and what you found, you’re doomed to repeat the search.  That old adage about how if you don’t learn from history, you’re doomed to repeat it is incredibly applicable to genealogy.

In fact, I think it’s more likely that a genealogist originally said it.

Pick Up Where You Left Off

Most of us can’t spend 12 hours a day, five days a week doing genealogy.  I certainly can’t.  Life happens.

I may have several records I want to search and only get through two or three of them before I have to stop and go do something else.  The difference now is that I write down what I’ve searched and what I found as I go.

I didn’t always do that.  In the past, when I’d come back to my research, sometimes I remembered everything I’d searched and the results.  Sometimes I remembered what I’d searched, but couldn’t remember the results.  Other times, I could only partially remember either one.  And occasionally, I couldn’t remember ever doing any of it.

Now, when life pulls me away from my research, I don’t have to reconstruct everything when I come back.  I can look at my documentation, see what I’ve already done and what I found, and pick up where I left off.

Whether I come back tomorrow, next month, or much later, I know where I stopped and where to begin again.

Write Down the Dead Ends Too

Documentation isn’t only about keeping track of what you find.  It’s also important to keep track of where you looked and found nothing.

If I search a record set and don’t find what I’m looking for, I document that too.  Otherwise, six months from now I may see that same record set, think it looks promising, and search the whole thing again.

It’s like going down a road and discovering it’s a dead end.  I need to document that it’s a dead end so I don’t accidentally turn down the same road again.

Finding nothing may not feel particularly useful at the time, but knowing where I’ve already looked can save me from wasting time looking there again.

Documentation Is the House Cleaning of Genealogy

Documentation—writing things down—is essential.  I know that now, but I didn’t when I first started.  And even when I was told it was important, I didn’t like doing it.

I wanted to do the work.  I wanted to find the records.  I wanted to find my people.  I wanted to know where I came from, and I wanted it all yesterday.  I wanted the excitement of the find.

And I think everybody who gets into genealogy understands that excitement.  There’s something about finding people you know are yours.  They don’t have to be famous.  They don’t have to have done anything extraordinary.  They’re just your people.

That excitement is real.  It’s part of what still keeps me doing genealogy today, and helping other people find their people is part of why I love teaching it.

But documentation is part of genealogy too.  Unfortunately for me, it’s just not as thrilling as finding people.  That’s my reality.

I think of it a lot like cleaning a house.  It’s not necessarily the part you’re excited to do.  It’s the work that you do so you can enjoy being in your home.

Now, there may be some crazy people out there who actually enjoy doing laundry or cleaning.  I say crazy because, as far as I’m concerned, enjoying either of those things is a little crazy.  I really don’t like doing them.

But I do like having a clean house.

Genealogy is the same way.  Documentation is the house cleaning of genealogy.  It’s part of the work that has to be done, even if it’s not the part that makes you excited to sit down and do genealogy.

I may not get excited about documenting a search, but I definitely like what having that documentation does for my research.

I Learned This One the Hard Way

I’ve spent a lot of years learning some of these lessons the hard way.  I’ve repeated searches, found records I’d already found, and wasted time trying to remember research I should have written down in the first place.

I can’t get any of that time back.

But I can learn from it.

These days, I take the time to document my research as I go.  Not because documenting is the exciting part of genealogy—it really isn’t for me.  I do it because I’ve learned what happens when I don’t.

If there’s one thing I hope you take away from all of my mistakes, it’s this: don’t look at documentation as something that takes time away from your research.

I’ve done genealogy both ways.

Can you tell which one has cost me more time?

Image Credit

Photo by Tookapic. “Person Writing on Notebook,” 2015. Pexels, Photo ID 8769. CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.