Ways of Working: Discover the way you work
Are you unsure what your working style is? Are you struggling to keep track of your hours on a project? Do you know how to plan for change? In this 3-part blog series, Lily Green, No Bindings’ director, shares her tips on planning, production and ways of working. These tips are ideal for anyone who is new to project managing or remote working.
Systems - what kind of project management system do you have time to maintain?
Common software packages you might like to try are Google Suite, Microsoft Office, Asana and Trello. What works for No Bindings is a five part folder system for each project. Example:
Folder one, ‘Set Up’, contains all materials relating to getting the project started
Folder two, ‘WIP’, stands for Work In Progress, and is where things are allowed to get messy.
Folder three, ‘Final Assets’, the final cut of audio or the final master design.
Folder four, ‘Public’, anything that can be circulated publicly, e.g. promotional photos, press releases, trailers
Folder five, ‘Feedback’, any quotes or questionnaires or reviews etc.
Templates - have you got templates for information you need to send out regularly?
No Bindings uses a template proposal document for when we have to respond to briefs. Each brief is unique, but having a template helps us process ideas and client needs. Our proposal template is set out like this:
Context - this is where we summarise what we understand the brief to be.
No Bindings - this normally stays the same. It’s a description of what No Bindings is and what we do.
Proposal - this is where we outline the project explaining how we are going to respond to the brief.
Budget options - this is where we provide different versions of our proposal at different price points.
Other templates you might want to think about are contracts and invoices.
Managing data - what kind of data are you handling?
Before thinking about how to manage data, I find it useful to think about what is data. Data could be lots of things, e.g. a client’s email address, a customer’s name and address, attendance numbers for an event, a collaborator’s phone number or a record of how many meetings you’ve had with someone. It’s important to understand data protection rules for legal reasons. But it’s also really helpful to carefully manage data to make your production and planning processes better.
For example, if you’re working with several artists on a single project or programme, a spreadsheet that you update after each meeting or interaction will help you track everyone’s progress and bring to light if you need to check in with people. It also reflects back at you how much work you’ve done managing these relationships and how much time you’ve spent too, an excellent resource for managing your time.
In conclusion, when it comes to production and planning, taking some time to discover the way you work is invaluable. Having an overview of how long you take to do things, what tasks you do most often and a map of where these resources are will make it so much easier to respond to enquiries, plan projects and work with others.
Next week, we’ll be looking at Working With Others - how do you keep on top of it all?