Routines

The past few years taught me that structure is a wondrous thing when there is just the right amount. Too much or too little is misery.—
James Weiner (@jamesweiner) January 04, 2013

Also, on that point. Setting the right amount of structure is *really* hard. People are complicated.—
James Weiner (@jamesweiner) January 04, 2013

I’m starting to recognise that I need to artificially establish routines that have been useful in the past. Checklists, accounts forms and RACI documents all have roots in working methods I’ve had to use and liked. But tools are different beasts to processes.

One of the things I left behind at Last.fm was a daily rhythm. For two years I wrote copy about music news for CBS radio, knocking out a thirty second script first thing in the morning. A quick scan of news sources, a bit of research, write, revise, rewrite, send. Try as I might, I haven’t found anything that good at cranking me up to speed since.

I could do that for this blog, but it wouldn’t feel like work. It would feel like blogging (a choice, a luxury, thinking into textboxes). It needs to feel like work.

One of the reasons I’m hoping to get week notes out on a Monday is because I don’t trust Mondays. They’re about catching up with the subtle shifts in perspective that happen among colleagues and clients over the weekend. Week notes have the capacity to focus that thought process for me, to assign bit of time to reflection and planning.

Doing that daily – not so useful. I tried, after speaking to Matt about that kind of stuff a while back, but it didn’t take. It’s also at the wrong end of the day to help me get started.

Kieron’s recent post about this kind of stuff reminded me page targets can be incredibly useful. I’m thinking about projects like The Polaroid Press and threesixfivestart and wondering if borrowing some of that rhythm might be useful for a particular comics project, and help me crank up to speed before my first tea has cooled.

————————–

In case the two tweets that open this don’t show up on your reader of choice, James remarked that “The past few years taught me that structure is a wondrous thing when there is just the right amount. Too much or too little is misery. Also, on that point. Setting the right amount of structure is *really* hard. People are complicated.“