This week we’re on playing along in a group exercise to see if we can make some automation improvements to our own day-to-day tasks. Last time, we started listing our inputs and outputs.

Today I'm just going to show my work and give you some in-depth insight into my task so you can see how we use this information in the next steps.

Here's what I have so far with my task:

Task: Write and publish a HaiQu daily email.

1. Review my idea list and the past few posts. What am I going to write about today?
2. If there are any Excel examples, build or open them and take screenshots.
3. If there are any diagrams or flowcharts, build or open them (using d2 or Powerpoint as required).
4. Write a draft of the email in markdown in my text editor.
5. Copy my draft to the ConvertKit editor on its website. Read through the email and polish, while inserting screenshots in the correct places.
6. Check spelling.
7. Write the title.
8. Publish to the email list
9. Publish the link to ex-twitter. Add tags.

Trigger: Every weekday, no specific time. I usually let ideas percolate over the day, and then write either late afternoon or after the kids are in bed. Let’s say after 4pm.

Inputs:

• I Build things and take screenshots in my examples folder (~/Dropbox/haiqu/examples)
• Usually write at my desk, but could be anywhere on my laptop.
• The “Emails.org” file in my text editor where I keep both ideas and draft posts
• The Convertkit editor website where I polish and post (https://app.convertkit.com/campaigns)

Output:

• Produces 1) an email to the mailing list and optionally the https://daily.haiqu.ca page and 2) a link on ex-twitter 3) Rarely a linkedin post. 4) Even rarer I combine multiple posts into something longer for the hylandqs.ca website.

Goals:

• Current: Just make the whole thing more seamless with less thought around the non-writing things.
• Future: I’d like to eventually have a low effort way to combine posts and then get them on linkedin.
• Ideally: Dreaming here, but I’d like to be able to do everything in one place with a few button clicks so I can just focus on the examples and writing. For example, to be able to select multiple articles and just have them be combined in a format I like, summarized, and create a linkedin post? that would be great!

Worth some effort?: Yes, I do this every weekday so the more time I can save myself and the more consistent it can be, the better.

Ok! I hope my example has been useful for you. Next time, we’re going to take all of this and use it to pick some low-hanging fruit, hopefully getting some easy wins right away with a useable system.

It’s been a super busy week preparing for the SQA conference and Saturday’s course. I’ll be travelling tomorrow and then have an even busier week ahead - so my posts may not be exactly daily. It’ll be worth the wait, I promise.

Until next time, thanks for reading!

– Brendan

p.s. Enjoy this message? Read more at the Hyland Quality Systems website.