Organization is the Gateway to Creativity

I love organization. Traveling with me? I have bandaids, wet wipes, a ziplock for your wet bathing suit, aspirin, and a corkscrew. Ask me to help with your event? I have a photo for your Twitter and Instagram feeds, cash to tip the guy who got the extra ice, a printed schedule for speakers, an extension cord, and your logo mounted on foam core (with sticky putty) for the podium. Meeting with me? I have an agenda, items I need answers to, URLs for all of the companies we will be discussing, and contact info for everyone involved in the call. Grocery shopping with me? I have a list, organized by department, of everything we need so that we don’t have to criss-cross the aisles.

I am that person.

Some people love this. Others … not so much. One person I worked with complained that my organization cramped her style and creativity. Anything other than working in the moment was too rigid.

Who is right? Does organization hinder creativity?

Margaret Heffernan explores this idea in an Inc. article about organization and creativity. Bottom line: structure enables creative people to stretch out; too much emphasis on process stifles creativity.

“Strangely, the overly bureaucratic company and the chaotic company share the same problem: It just gets too hard to get things done,” says Heffernan.

Organization absolutely enables creativity for me. If I have a framework, a deadline, and a goal, then I feel free to produce. Otherwise, I tend to procrastinate and waste time. Or worse, waste the time of my clients or team. And let’s face it, the job of a small business marketer is to get things done.

I find that once the framework is established and documented, it’s easy to be creative.

I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about PlanITPDQ, why I built it, who can use it, and what I hope it delivers to people like you. Verne Harnish’s book Scaling Up outlines a framework for what businesses need in place before they can achieve their growth potential. One of the primary things is identifying your core values.

For PlanITPDQ, creativity through organization is our core value.

We offer a framework for organizing your blog posts, events, videos, editorial calendar opportunities, email newsletters, and other creative  content you need to market and grow your business.

By organizing your plans, I want PlanITPDQ to free you to execute. If you know, for example, that a top-tier publication plans a story about your market niche, you have time to think of how you can best contribute and the heads up as to when you need to do it. You won’t be stuck looking at an article that quotes your competitor and thinking, “Damn, I wish I had my act together to get into that story.”

By having a spot to store ideas (the PlanITPDQ idea bank) you can hang onto those virtual sticky notes in a format where you can grab them when you need them. You can flesh out that thread of an idea when your creative side is ready.

I want you to succeed, and to do that, you need a framework. That’s why I built PlanITPDQ. Let me know if it helps you make sense of your plans so that you are free to execute creatively. I am always available to help you set up your PlanIT – just reach out to set a time for a screen share. I am on your side!

Have you created your PlanIT yet? Sign up today for your beta account.