“…too much is not enough! Oh, I can ride your heart ’til it breaks. Oooooooh, I got what it takes!…”– from the 1981 movie Fame
One problem that bloggers and professionals both struggle with at times is organization. There are lots of books and blog articles out there covering tools you can use to organize your work life. But sometimes, I genuinely believe, too much organization can be counter productive.
I remember reading an article once that stated that news stands which were a bit dis-organized were actually more profitable than news stands which were kept orderly. (The time expense of paying employees to constantly straighten and keep all of the magazines in perfect order all of the time turned out to be greater than the value created by that order. News stands it turned out, really only need to be straightened once or twice per day.)
Most successful professionals well know that having a perfectly formatted schedule has little to do with showing up on time and moving through tasks efficiently. While you should use whatever organizational tools you need, it will certainly benefit you to be aware of how much time and effort you put into organizing that might be better spent on productive activity. This was not actually a new lesson for me, but it was very much brought home to me by an exchange I had with my buddy Dane the other day. Although you wouldn’t know it from looking at his current blog, Dane is one of the sharpest WordPress developers I know,
Dane is absolutely right that for most niche bloggers, scheduling content in advance is a great way to avoid feeling overwhelmed by deadlines and an announced publishing schedule. However, I honestly believe that for this personal blog my original idea of writing two days ahead is the best solution. It allows me to minimize the “Internet time shifting” which I have found bothersome, and keeps even personal posts reasonably fresh while allowing me to avoid the stress of constantly rushing to meet a slipping deadline. If you blog on an announced schedule, how organized are you? Do you spend more time planning your posts than writing and promoting them?
PS– if you’re wondering what the heck that image is, I explain in this post how I go about choosing them.
Libdrone's Thoughts and Musings 
Yes i do wonder why this picture!
great vision 🙂
I find that one of the biggest challenges is deciding what to blog about and just how much to blog. I live in Spain where over 1 million Brits etc do not speak the native language and therefore miss so much of what is going on. These are my target market. Spanish TV/radio/press give me a constant/consistent source of blogging material. I do not want to be a “free translator” service and nor do I want to blog to an audience of one. Scheduling seems to be the answer. x blogs per day, y blogs per evening etc and I thus try to focus on the most interesting topics …..and fail LOL
Deadlines? I work best to deadlines as I have a dreadful habit of constantly re-writing articles to achieve perfection ……and fail. My first shot is usually the best!
Steve– I think for most writers the first draft is usually the best. If what you are blogging is local news, I think you’d probably be better served letting an error or two slip through than let your posts become stale while re-writing them in search of elusive perfection.
I’m so un-organized except when it goes for making grocery lists. Everything else is a mess.
Somehow I muddle through chaos, noise and mess…
So it’s not YOURS, at least?
Here I was, thinking it somehow went along with “bacon” and I was mentally composing your epitaph.
lmao. No, it is not mine. (Ron told me it looked like the innards of someone dying of something very nasty.) (wondering if I would be the first writer to be eulogized by a dust bunny who is a stickler for proper grammar)
hahahaha Alan, I nearly feinted when I saw that .. you are full of surprises 🙂
I try, Gaye. I really do try 🙂
What is that picture?? Certainly a conversation provoker 🙂
Posting your blog at the right time of the day according to the audience you want to address is VIP
Follow the link and read about how I choose the pictures 😉 Do you have or can you point me to any info on just when the right time of day to post a blog is, Kathleen?
The photo is disgusting. I never like blood or that kind of detail. It’s too much for me 😦