Let’s say you’re a creative person who has decided to do a particular project. Maybe you want to create a concrete product (e.g. a CD, art show, book, play, film, performance piece, website, screenplay, acting reel). Perhaps you’ve chosen to accomplish a particular task (e.g. get an agent, find a job that uses your talents, create a workshop). Maybe you want to learn a specific skill (e.g. playing banjo, blogging, soldering silver). Perhaps your goal is to establish an ongoing practice (e.g. playing piano daily or cranking out five articles a week or performing a new stand-up set at one Open Mic Night every month). For our purposes, let’s call all of these things ‘projects’. Once you identify your project, there are benefits to planning a course of action, as discussed in the previous article on this topic. Today, let’s delve into how to plan your project.
Here’s a step by step guide:
1. Clear some time to think about your project. Record your thoughts in a manner that works best for you (e.g. on paper, electronically, on a tape recorder, on a poster, in sketches). It’ll be important to keep all your planning notes together in one convenient place.
2. Define the general scope of your project. For example: “I want to write a television sit com pilot.” “I want to find a mentor.” “I want to compose five songs a week.” “I want to establish the habit of practicing my guitar every day.”
3. Identify the purpose of your project. Be honest with yourself. This may seem odd but I promise it’s helpful to understand what’s really motivating you. “I’ve got a book inside me and it feels like I’m going to burst until it’s down on paper” is different than “I wanna be rich and famous” or “Well, Phil wrote a book and if he can do it, I can do it.” If you think about your real motivations, you may conclude that a different project is more appropriate at this time. When you find a project that truly moves you deep down – that connects with your core talents – its purpose will feel important and meaningful. That kind of purpose will spark you into action and give you energy throughout the project. Should you find your motivation flagging, you can remind yourself why you’re doing this particular project: a fulfilling purpose will propel you back on course.
4. Refine the scope of your project. Be specific as possible. What EXACTLY do you want to do? By when? For example: “I want to self-publish a 150 page tofu cookbook within ten months.”
5. Now take a moment to ask yourself: what has worked for me in the past? When I have tackled important projects in the past, how did I organize myself? Self-help guru Barbara Sher points out that ALL of us have accomplished a great deal in life, even though it may not feel like it. But if you think about what you did to get through high school/raise your kids/potty-train your pet/sell your house , you may remember specific tactics that worked well for you. Maybe you need to do the most important tasks first thing in the morning – perhaps setting up weekly homework quotas got you through college. Identify what you already know about yourself and what works best for you to get things done.
6. Using what you know about yourself, sketch out a general gameplan for your project. Break it down into reasonable chunks. What needs to happen, in what order, by when? Identify some key milestones and deadlines along the way. If your plans feel scary or overwhelming, then break them down further into smaller and smaller pieces until you have a clear, calm picture of the simple action items required. For example: “find an agent” would break down into chunks such as “research who represents similar work”, “write a kick-ass query”, “compose tailored versions of the query for each of my top choices”, “submit my queries and follow-up.” If the first chunk terrifies you, you could break it into action items like “Go to the book store and find books similar to mine.” “Read the acknowledgments in each of these books to see who represented them.” “Look up each of these agents on www.agentquery.com to see what they are seeking.” “Google them.” “Ask fellow writers what they know about them.” “Prioritize these agents in order of my preference.”
7. Review your initial gameplan: is it reasonable? Doable? Motivating? Too challenging or too lax? Will life allow this plan? Adjust your plan, accordingly. You are trying to set yourself up for success – not stress yourself out. The ideal pace is to make steady progress such that you enjoy the process and delight in your little victories along the way.
8. Enhance your plan: Identify what support you have available and what support you’ll need to find. Establish accountability: what will you do? What will others do? Identify what information you need to carry out your plan.
9. Identify potential obstacles and challenges you may face. Brainstorm potential answers to each one.
10. Establish a process for regularly monitoring your progress. What are reasonable metrics to keep? What’s the easiest way you can review your actions? For example, Jerry Seinfeld keeps himself in check by putting a big ‘X’ on his calendar for every day he writes a new joke. He is highly motivated to ‘not break the chain’ of X’s. Monitoring yourself is critical for keeping yourself on track, rewarding yourself for your accomplishments and for making adjustments as needed. “Oops. I thought I could make six necklaces a week but for the past month I’ve only managed four so that’s a more reasonable quota for me to have in the future.”
11. Schedule your first key actions and milestones as well as your first ‘progress check-in’. A weekly check-in seems to work well for most people. During these brief sessions, ask: What did I accomplish? What worked well? What didn’t? What adjustments need to be made? Adjust your plan accordingly.
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Activity: Pick a project, any project. Use the steps above to plan it.
When you plan a project, what works well for you? What doesn’t? We’d love to hear about your experiences — please fill us in, using the comment box below.
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For more, check out my book GOAL SETTING & PLANNING FOR MULTI-TALENTED PEOPLE: How to figure out
what you really want — and how to actually get it available here for only $2.99: http://amzn.to/goalsettingkindle
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