Mule

This is Part 2 of a series of posts aimed at helping other maker-owners achieve balanced improvement in all the aspects of owning a business and making what they sell. "If its important do it everyday." - Wrestling Coach Dan Gable I first heard this quote from strength coach Dan John.   It's brilliant, right? One of those quotes that say something obvious that everyone has been missing.  We all run around looking for the flashy answers. We climb up mountains to speak to the wise man sitting at the top just to come back down more confused. The farmer at the bottom gives us a sideways look and says something like "Less thinking, more doing," and goes back to work. How did we learn to walk, talk, play sports, do schoolwork, communicate ideas with others? We did it everyday.  We didn't have a 6 hour practice on Saturday and then show up for a game the following Friday.  We learned to talk - without much direct instruction everyday- just by hearing people talk, a lot, everyday. It was almost effortless.  THe same should be true with our worklife.   Do you suck at the financial side of things? Maybe it's because you've been business for a few years and the only time you learn new financial ideas is when you made a giant mistake. Or tax season.  Or you stumble across a term online and look it up.  What about your process?  It takes you five hours to make the widget. Why doesn't it take 4? Do you know why?  Maybe it's because you haven't set aside deliberate time to study your work flow, make notes on your mistakes so you can see trends, or read books on process engineering like Toyota or ISO 9000. If you don't set aside daily time for every aspect of your work you're digging a hole somewhere.   Stress starts when we don't realize that and we let holes get bigger than we can handle. Then we realize we have more holes and the reckless sprint begins, overloading our brains. Our brains try to cope and then filter out information that may be necessary. The cycle continues.  A system that  provides consistent forward progress in all those areas eliminates the stress and provides evidence based information towards improving the system. "If it's important, do it everyday" is the basis for my thoughts on designing a system for the maker-owner.   Consistent work in achievable amounts is how we learn and master anything and making things and owning a business is no different. The short of it: 1. "If its important do it everyday." Consistent work in achievable amounts is how we learn and master anything 2. If you aren't attending to an aspect of your work daily a hole is being done.