My first ever job, back in the 80s, was in IT. Designing and programming self-maintenance systems for big computers.

Ironic given that now I can barely work my phone :)

But back then, I and everyone I worked with prided ourselves in how creative and innovative we were.

So when our firm introduced a new quality management philosophy full of processes and checklists and reusable code, we rebelled.

Big time.

We hated it. All these processes and standard ways of doing things would stifle our creativity. The very thing that made us special.

When, eventually, we were forced to use them, something very different happened.

Instead of spending our creativity reinventing the wheel on a task that had been done a hundred times before, forcing us to follow standard procedures freed up our creativity to focus on the key pieces of work that genuinely needed it.

We ended up being more creative at the things that mattered. By being less creative at the things that didn't.

And just as importantly, it freed up a lot of time to focus on those key creative tasks too.

One thing I've noticed with a lot of the professionals I work with (and with myself too) is we like to do something new every time.

We don't want to send out a standard follow-up message to people we meet at an event, we want to tailor a specific message just for them.

We don't want to use a proposal template. We want to create the perfect one every time.

All sounds great in theory. Unfortunately, we don't have the time or the mental energy to do it properly.

So we end up not following up at all. And we send in a completely unique but not very good proposal because we had to make all the boilerplate and standard stuff from scratch.

Next time you have a little bit of downtime between client work, think about creating some templates and standard processes for key tasks you have to do often. For example:

• A pre-recorded video that gets sent out to everyone who schedules a call with you to prepare them for the call while further building your credibility
• A pre-written series of follow-up emails you send in sequence to everyone who signs up for your lead magnet so they get the very best of your ideas without you needing to craft new emails all the time.
• A “pack” of personal follow-up items – articles or books to post, events to invite to, questions to ask – that can be used again and again with each new potential client you meet.
• A proposal template with the relevant sections and boilerplate in place so you don’t have to scrabble around when you have a short deadline for submission.
• Templated email responses for questions you often get asked or frequent requests for information.

Save your brainpower for the stuff that really does need to be creative and different every time.