#16: Less Chaos, More Creativity: The Simple Systems That Free Up Your Time

In this episode of the Jeweler's View, we delve deeper into the systems that can help you work smarter, not harder. Our host shares practical tips and free or low-cost tools that can streamline your daily tasks and free up time for creativity. Whether you're a jewelry maker or a creative entrepreneur, you'll learn about digital calendars, project management tools, and efficient filing systems. Tune in to discover how to set up structures that support growth, reduce chaos, and boost productivity, paving the way for your creative endeavors to flourish. Don't miss out on actionable insights and a sneak peek into next week's topic about playing to your strengths and outsourcing.

Transcript

Episode 16: Less Chaos, More Creativity: The Simple Systems That Free Up Your Time

[00:00:00] Hey there, welcome back to the Jeweler's View. I wanted to continue this discussion we had last episode on systems that really help you work smarter, not harder. I was going to say harder, not smarter. That's not what we want. We want smarter. let's dig a little deeper. I wanted to give you a few more things that you could walk away with right away.

that you could put into your daily setup so that you can free up your creative time. the topic today, less chaos, more creativity, and the simple systems that can free up your time. This one really hits, Home for me, because the last few months, really, since I started this podcast and started the one with Rio Grande a few years ago, I have been building systems without even really realizing it.

The more you do things, the more you need to think about having a system for it. Even as simple as just a digital calendar that we mentioned last episode, I want to dive a little deeper today and give you [00:01:00] some more things that you can use and create a lot more ease. So again, this one hits home for me.

I have been building system after system, and I know my future self is going to be so grateful that I did so that I can continue to grow and be here and do the creative work that I meant to be doing. want to give you a no fluff breakdown of essential, not overwhelming systems. We don't need more overwhelm.

To help save time and stay organized and focus on what you love. You might share this with somebody who's not a jewelry maker. The more feedback I get on this podcast, the more I realize it's not really just for jewelers, it's for anybody who's trying to build a business or make their creative passion, their center point of their life and their goals and create income doing so.

so, if you ever feel like admin tasks are eating up your creative time, I'm sure you can relate to this one, then this episode is for you. Today we're talking about a few [00:02:00] simple, free, or low cost systems that can take stress off your plate so you can focus more on your craft. what you'll learn today's episode is three to five most useful systems for creatives.

Without tech overwhelm and how these tools set you up for success. When you decide to grow or outsource stick around, because I'll share how these simple systems will support you in bigger ways, like hiring and scaling your business moving forward. So why does systems matter for creatives?

Creativity thrives on freedom. But without structure, things can get messy really fast. I used to think I could just keep it all in my head until I lost important orders, forgot client deadlines, looked unprofessional, and spent way too much time searching for things. Instead of creating, you know how you spend like an hour looking for that thing.

If you had a system for it, you'd be able to know exactly where it is. [00:03:00] Go right to it. Copy paste, do all the things that save hours of time. And don't forget about the importance of your energy, right? If you're spending all your energy. on admin tasks and repeating these tasks that don't have systems in place, there's not much left for the creativity part.

And that's our goal. Let's get back to what we do best, and that's creating.

The right systems give you more time for your craft without making you feel boxed in or stuck in those repetitive tasks . Anything you do, and I've said it before, I'll say it again, anything you do more than twice should have a system. I didn't learn this right away. It took me years to implement.

A lot of team members and assistants had to pound it into my head for it to make sense. I didn't want to live like that. I didn't want to have a system for everything. But the bigger my school grew, the bigger my businesses grew, the more I needed to implement systems. So let's narrow down to the top four systems that are free.

We love that word. Or low [00:04:00] cost because we don't need more subscriptions and more things to pay for while we're trying to scale our business The one I mentioned last episode and i'll mention it again here Google docs and google drive along with the google calendar, right which we'll get into think of this like your digital filing cabinet and many of you may be using this I want you to use it even more as a way to track and organize everything into one place You I talk to a lot of creatives one on one Most of them are still using a notebook or digging through emails looking for that one idea that they had. Lots of post it notes, lots of notebooks, right?

I had one person I sat with the other day and mentioned, I have a notebook for my, Life stuff and my kids and my family and I have one for my business and she goes and I can't find either one Maybe you can relate to this. I've been there. I've had a stack of notebooks still I like to look back at them and realize how far I have come and how much I've been able to accomplish over the years that aside The notebook can be great for jotting [00:05:00] down a stream of consciousness and, a lot of people really do work well with a notebook, but I want to encourage you to transfer that information.

over to a digital filing cabinet, like Google Docs, Google Drive. So that when you lose the notebook, which is inevitable, you're not worried about losing those ideas that sometimes they don't come back, so it's good to write them down. So how you can use this for SOPs, or Standard Operating Procedures, another great corporate term that have adopted over the years.

But these are just things that you do often, like client emails, pricing, material orders, things like that. Standard operating procedures, things that you do again and again. We need to have a procedure for each and there is a procedure. We just sometimes don't write it down or have a system in place for it.  

you can also use Google drive to store design ideas, sketches, and inspiration, so everything's in one place, set up folders for your projects, orders, and collaborations. And I highly suggest creating folders. So there's not just everything scattered [00:06:00] start with an organized approach, and you'll be really grateful later and the price of this.

Free. it's right there in your Gmail account. click the little hamburger stacker on the right corner, and you'll see you have tons of tools there free to use just for having a Gmail account. I personally love Google Calendar. I was on Microsoft for a while. I moved back over to Google because it's scheduling without stress.

I have it on my phone. I have it on my laptop. I have it on my PC. If it's not scheduled, it's not real. It's not going to happen. how do you use it? You can block studio time like an appointment to protect your creative flow. You can keep things batched in different segments, right? You can set reminders for orders, deadlines, goal lines, and social media posts so you don't have to think about them.

They're on the calendar. You'll get to it when it comes up. you can also use color coding for personal versus business tasks. I have a band, I have things in yellow, I have a business, I have things in [00:07:00] purple, my family stuff's in orange, you can decide your own colors and whatever works and resonates, right?

So it makes it a little more user friendly and easier on the eyes when you're looking at all of the things on the calendar. I also like to look, just a side note, at the week sometimes, sometimes I'll break it down to the day, and sometimes when I'm scheduling multiple appointments, I'll do the month view.

But I really like day to day, just using that day. Look at the day, focus on that, you set everything on there that you'd like to accomplish. If you get more done, great, and if you can't get everything done, you roll it to the next day, easily by Clicking and moving things around. So check it out if you're not using it.

Just start thinking about getting your written calendar or your planner moved over to a Google calendar. Another one that's useful, a lot of people use, creatives use, is Trello or ClickUp for advanced users. This is a task in project management For visual thinkers, this is a game changer.

So how do you use this? You can create simple boards for production timelines, custom [00:08:00] orders, and marketing tasks. You can track the progress on ongoing designs or client projects. So if you have multiple projects going. Like I do sometimes, this is a great tool to use. You can use the today list to reduce overwhelm.

Again, one day at a time. The price of this one, free. There are paid options and you may get to a place where you'd like to pay that fee because it's worth it and you're seeing how much time it saves. And how much more organized and easy your has become. Another one that I'm using a lot, and I'm sure many of you are already, is Canva.

This is an easy professional marketing content creator. And if you struggle with making social media posts, website banners, price sheets, Canva makes this pretty simple. And you can use it to create branded templates for Instagram, pricing guides, they even make carousels, or client lookbooks, things like that that you may not know how to build or have a graphic designer in your pocket.

Canva's really replacing the need for a lot of those things that we might [00:09:00] outsource otherwise. The price of this one, there's a free version, yay, and the pro version I think is 12. 99 right now and that could change, but it's totally worth it. You can also use it to batch social media content, to your Instagram and your Facebook accounts, create beautiful posts, and publish on calendar planner that's built right into Canva.

They keep adding new things. So by the time you listen to this, it's probably even more robust. Definitely something to look at. If you're looking to get more visual content, create a resume in there. You can create all kinds of templates. The sky is the limit. They have a lot of options in there. So let's talk about setting yourself up for growth.

These systems aren't just about today, my friend. They're the foundation for hiring when you need help. When I built my jewelry school, my team helped me see that clear systems make it easy to delegate and scale. if someone needed to leave the company, I had training already built in. I had SOPs, we had a training.

[00:10:00] operations manual, things that we could use so somebody could train someone else easily without starting from scratch every time. for example, if you hire an assistant, when you get ready, they can easily follow your saved Google docs or a Trello workflow instead of you explaining everything again and again.

So I gave you a lot of things to think about. You may want to go back and listen again, dig deeper. There's more software out there that I couldn't even mention in this shorty episode. there are new things coming out, task management apps, there's time trackers, there's all kinds of things that you can use that really help you start to understand and see your business in a new way and create efficiency and ease in everything that you do.

I hope this week you're going to pick one system from this list and start using it this week. The goal isn't to add more to your plate, but to take things off your plate so you can spend more time creating and designing, doing the things that are your superpower.

If you love this kind of [00:11:00] structure, or at least are easing into the idea of more structure in your business, and you want more tools to streamline and scale, My upcoming workshop is going to be really helpful for this. We're going to dig even deeper. I'm building a full six week as well, transformation course.

So make sure that you're on my email list. So you don't miss these announcements. Also each week I send an inspirational email and I want to make sure that you're getting those. That pair nicely with these episodes. please keep sharing the word. You can watch it on YouTube now at the Jewelers View.

And next week, we're going to dig into playing to your strengths and understanding your weaknesses, when to outsource. And we'll dig a little deeper into the idea of when you might be ready to start asking for a little more help so you can get farther, faster. And with ease. Don't forget the ease part.

All right, my friend. Until then, onward and upward.  [00:12:00]