Making Life Easier....
Organization is not my strong suit. I have things stacked up around my office that have been sitting there for 5, maybe 10 years. Every once and a while I shift them or dust them off. But never deal with them. I can’t bring myself to throw them away.
I asked myself, what is most in the way of making me money (organizationally)? I found out something about organization, it’s helped me spiritually and made me more money.
I resist any streamlining or efficiency. Mostly because I want don’t want to be a grown up. Efficient offices are for adults, that’s not me.
But every once and a while, I will take on a simple organizational project. The dividends pay off for years, actually the rest of my life. Once they are done, they maintain themselves, sort of a self cleaning oven for offices.
In the old days, I used to write down booking information on a piece of paper and clip it into a calendar. That was scary because there was a fear of losing that calendar or double booking if I didn’t pay attention. That used to happen to me from time to time. It’s really a drag to have to tell someone I took another booking because I double booked myself. I felt terrible about it.
I put a simple organizational plan into place. I made a booking sheet. On the sheet, I had the obvious, time date, location, how referred to me, phone, how referred to me.
But here’s what changed my life, I put in a self check system. I had a spot that said. “Entered in Calendar?”. “Confirmation mailed?” “Reconfirmed?” “thank you sent?” next to each question mark I left a blank spot to put in the date it was done. The easiest way was just to do it all at the same time. If I didn’t send the confirmation, I knew it would stick in the back of my mind, giving me pain.
This is still the basic booking pattern I use, except now I do it on the computer. Online calendar, email confirmation etc. Just a 1,2,3 pattern.
So, what used to be a pain, became fairly efficient. I automatically, send a confirmation, enter in my calendar etc. It’s a non thinking process that used to stress me out. As I write this, it seems obvious but I do still know performers that always struggle with keeping things straight.
I don’t take what I did lightly. Putting all this into place took a few hours of designing and thinking. That wasn’t the hard part, it was getting to it.
I’ve gotten so efficient and fearless in my booking process I put my calendar online so everyone can see it. I could never have done that if I didn’t have a fool proof system of booking. If I’m taking the step of putting a calendar on the internet, it had better be up to date to the minute.
The other place that killed me year after year-Taxes. Yuck patoo. I hate dealing with taxes so much I happily pay someone to do them. If you knew what a cheapskate I am, this would shock you. I also happen to be kind of geeky and like math. I really like simple algebra and I could do taxes for other people, I’d probably even enjoy it.
But my own, too personal I hate it! I have to look at my income and what I spend, ugh.
So, what I started doing (and this took real mental effort) I place a manila folder in my filing cabinet. One is for credit card statements (I highly recommend using one credit card for business only, it makes taxes much easier). I marked it Credit Card Statements 2011. I have another Credit Card Transactions 2011 (I take credit cards). Another is my income. Every time I go to the bank, I copy all the checks and put a date on the sheet. I put the copies into a folder marked “checks 2011”
In the area of taxes. I still don’t like them but I just pull out the marked folders and add things up at the end of the year. It’s also saved on clutter. I don’t have credit card receipts sitting around. It’s by no means a perfect system but it’s fairly simple for a one man band.
Now this all may seem pretty rudimentary and maybe even lame. But I can now take a booking and do all the steps and send the confirmation back in under five minutes. This goes a long way toward making the customer comfortable.
Where are you annoyed with your office? What causes you stress?
My life is one of improvisation. I LIKE mayhem around me, I have a clown sense, I like things haphazard. Even when my office is clean it’s a bit crazy looking, there are spinning plates over here, a television painted bright orange with fuzzy rabbit ears over there. Two shelves of mad books and mad magazines, a closet spilling out costumes.
I have to figure out a way to keep my comfortable mayhem and still get to where I’m supposed to be.
The most important thing in the world to me is to be at a show on time and make a families event the most special I can. I work a lot on the funny but it won’t be special day if my customers are worried about me showing up.
With that in mind I made my booking process automatic. This works wonders for my clients. I hear over and over, “you’re so efficient” or “I appreciate how thorough you are” Efficiency is not natural for me. I also don’t like the nagging feeling of there is something I have to do. Or I forgot to send the contract I promised.
You can’t have mayhem and efficiency. I figured out a small way of keeping my mayhem in the important areas, I have efficiency.
Find a repetitive task in your booking process and standardize it. An email inquiry? Spend time writing and rewriting, or find a response you’ve used and particularly like, then copy and paste it into your response. Do you send thank yous after your shows? Make it standard and just add the persons name.
I am really unhappy with myself if I’m meaning to send a confirmation and haven’t or am avoiding my taxes. This takes my energy, I have very little creativity. Instead of writing jokes, I end up watching TV using the electronic drug to push down my annoyance.
Making things streamlined increases my well being and creativity.
I think these small things allow you to become a much funnier entertainer.
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