In this post, I’m sharing an excerpt from my book The Year of You for Creatives: 365 Journal-Writing Prompts for Doing Your Best Creative Work. This template is from a bonus section at the back of the book. I hope it’s helpful! If you’d like to use journaling to explore your creative work in more depth, you can check out the book here.
How do you start a new creative project? Dive right in or take time to map out the initial steps first? Whatever your approach, if it works for you, then keep going! If you’re like me, and fall into the latter category, below you’ll find a new project deep dive template you can use in your journal. This will help you get clear on a few key points before starting and provide you with a few guideposts to keep you on the path towards completion.
I’ve deliberately kept the template below general so you can build on it for your particular creative endeavour. As with the other journaling tools and templates in this book, adapt it so that it works for you. Here is the outline:
• Aim of project: What are you hoping to create?
• Deadline (if relevant): When do you need to (or would you like to) complete this project by? Then 1.5x your estimate.
• Audience: Who is this project for? How does that influence the outcome of the project?
• 30-second pitch/blurb: Imagine you’re explaining this project to someone you’ve just met at a party. What is the 30-second summary?
• Master list of tasks: Get everything out of your head in one giant list first, then you can organise tasks into a linear process. You can add to this list as you think of more tasks along the way.
• Timeline: Week by week. If timeline isn’t relevant, you can also group tasks by area in a way that makes sense to you so that it’s easier to tackle them in a logical order.
• Research: What questions need to be answered for this project? What do you need to learn more about?
• Materials: What do you need to make this project happen? What do you already have and what will you need to acquire?
• Estimated cost: What specific costs does this project involve? What do you estimate they will be?
• Help needed: Contractors, freelancers, or employees you will work with directly.
• Waiting for: Are you waiting for any information, graphics, or other assets before you can begin?
• Miscellaneous: Notes, sketches, and anything else you can think of that would be helpful in this planning stage.
• Fun Extras: Playlists, vision boards/mood boards (visual representations of the project from social media, magazines, etc.). places to visit for inspiration, and more. What would add an element of fun inspiration to this project? Make a list under this heading.
I hope that helps as you embark on your next exciting project. Happy creating!
Photo by Estée Janssens on Unsplash
