“You need one place to plan and another place to keep information.”

— Laura Joyce Davis

[00:00:00] Laura: Here's a true story. In the beginning, all of these modules were created for just one person. Me, let me explain way back in season one of shelter in place when it was just me creating daily episodes. I was building the plane as I flew it. I didn't know when or where I land, but what I did know was that what I thought was a fairly simple structure, kept getting increasingly complex.

[00:00:27] I shared with you last week that I thought that process would just include four steps, writing a script, recording, audio, editing, audio, and then publishing it.

[00:00:37] It only took me a few episodes to recognize that within each of those four steps were many others and that those sub-steps weren't always predicting. But there were also other steps that I hadn't even known to include things that weren't part of the production process, but that were important if I wanted to grow both personally and professionally.

[00:00:58] So from very early on, I started documenting my process. At first, it was just checklists that I would post on my wall, things that I would do every time I made an episode, when those checklists got too long, I moved them to project management tools like Trello in between making episodes.

[00:01:17] I tried to learn how other podcasters kept track of their work. I made spreadsheets and Google docs dipped into a sauna click up and so many project management tools that I can no longer recall them all

[00:01:30] In case you're under the false impression that I am a naturally organized person. I was the kid whose room was always messy, who would go upstairs to do my homework, but hours later be lost in a story. My brain almost never moves in a straight line. It's more like a spiral staircase where I come around to the same ideas again.

[00:01:51] And again, Though to be fair, even that metaphor is probably a little too neat. You can bet that if I'm moving from point a to point B, I'll take a detour to C D E and Q. Before I finally arrive at my destination,

[00:02:06] one of the best and earliest lessons that I've learned is to surround yourself with people who can teach you, who are skilled in the areas where you struggle. And as fate would have it, I was raised by one of those people to this day. My mom is one of the most organized people I know, and it was from her that I learned how to make lists and schedules, how to keep a calendar.

[00:02:26] It was thanks to her that I'd gotten in the habit of documenting my process in those early days of podcasting. But the longer I did this work, the more time I found myself devoting to managing the process itself. Every time I thought I finally had a great system in place, something would shift or change and I'd have to rethink the process all over again.

[00:02:49] This module, which we're calling befriending, the beast can be summed up in two words. Project management. It's the skill of not just being organized, but of managing a lot of different categories of activities at once. It's so essential to podcasting that there are whole courses you can take on it. One of which is Lauren write-ins, which our project manager, Melissa lint has taken and recommends. 

[00:03:15] We'll include a link for it in case you want to check it out yourself.

[00:03:18] I began this tutorial by telling you about my own early efforts at project management, because I think it's important to say up front that you don't have to love project management to be a great podcast eater, but you do need to have some sort of system in place,

[00:03:33] put in the simplest terms possible. You need one place to plan and another place to keep information. One or both of those things could live in an online project management tool or an app, but they could also be in a notebook or in a giant post-it note on your wall.

[00:03:50] The goal of this module is to present you with some possible options for these two categories. And to use our own experience with project management is a case study to help you discern which tools will work best for your particular project. 

[00:04:04] One of the exercises for this week's module is the wheel of life. It's a prioritization exercise that Nate and I have been doing for years, and one of the most helpful ways that we found to evaluate our life and figure out where we need to make changes.

[00:04:18] We've also adapted that exercise for what we're calling the wheel of podcasting, which is essentially the wheel of life, but applied to two distinct areas of podcasting production and promotion,

[00:04:32] just as work-life balance, probably isn't possible.

[00:04:35] We doubt that it's possible to have a perfectly circular wheel of podcasting, but understanding where you're feeling strong and where you'd like to do better, can help you get a bigger picture of where you're spending your time and where you'd like to be focusing more energy.

[00:04:51] And this week's reflection, I'll take you deeper into the story behind stuck on the staircase. An episode that we created when we were right in the thick of realizing that all of the systems we'd put in place during our first two seasons weren't working anymore. Finally for this week's coaching call, we're going to ask you to do your own wheel of podcasting and then choose a project management system to try out for yourself. The exercises and tools that we're providing in this module are not intended to be used all at once.

[00:05:21] Rather see them as possible ways to flex grow and adapt. And if your current project management system is working great, wonderful consider these tools, something that you can keep in your creative toolbox that you can return to. If you find yourself stuck down the road, if there's just one thing that we hope that you get from this module, it's this project management at its best is adaptable. 

[00:05:46] Whether or not, it needs to change. Depends on the context and the people to take you deeper into the journey of how our system has changed. I've invited someone to talk with me who played a big role in helping us evolve. 

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