Leadership: A Look Inside

Have you wondered what it's like to publish a blog?

For example, this blog is published five times a week, each time consisting of about 200 to 350 words. Since starting May 2007, I have published 578 blog articles.

Here's my process.

1) Collect Ideas.

I am always seeking ideas for my blog and other articles, such as my monthly newsletter. I jot these ideas on index cards while walking, on scrap paper while working, and so. Then I save these notes in a folder. Right now, that folder contains a 2-in thick stack of ideas. This serves as a valuable resource in case I run low on current ideas. Right now I have about a dozen on my desk.

2) Draft Ideas.

I'll write blog articles weeks in advance. Some of these drafts may wait months before I edit them into a context that I want to publish. Some of them may be published in other places, such as on article web sites.

3) Store Ideas.

I keep my blogs in a FileMaker database.
 

- - - Screen Shot of my blog database - - -


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This database also serves to manage publication of the blogs. For example, I have set up scripts that assemble text, combining the article, the key point, and the signature information. Other scripts log on to TypePad. (I also have other databases that I use to save longer articles, poems, and general ideas.)

4) Post Ideas.

Ideally, I have at least a few days worth of blogs waiting to appear. For example, this morning (September 4) I've been writing and posting blogs for next week. This blog will appear a week later on Friday, September 11.

5) Publish Ideas.

The FileMaker database also helps me sort and organize articles on particular topics. This is useful, for example, when I want to compile collections of these articles into a larger work, such as a book.

There's an important message in this.

Notice that I have developed a system to help me with an important task: preparing and publishing blogs. This makes my work more efficient and the results more effective.

So how about you?

Have you developed systems to manage key activities in your business? Do you keep track of valuable ideas? Are you moving the results of your work upward into places of greater visibility so that you can profit fully from them?

Key Point: Build systems, they make work easier.

Much success,

Steve Kaye

714-528-1300
 

PS: Building systems is one of the topics covered in my workshop on Time Management.
 

PPS: Here it is September 9, and I'm making minor changes in this blog to include ideas that occurred to me during the past week. I also added a screen shot of the top part of my blog database.

Author, Speaker, IAF Certified Professional Facilitator

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